Brothers in Arms: A Call to Arms
by Solid Shark
Summary: Amidst the chaos of the renewed war, Kevin Walker, retired warrior, must face his past with the ZAFT special forces unit ABADDON... once and for all...
1. Chapter 1: Sleeping Tiger

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"As I write this, it's been nearly two years since the war... yet to me, it feels even longer in some ways, shorter in others. It seems but yesterday that Cagalli and I reunited at last, in the Libyan desert, and I joined the _Archangel_'s crew; it seems so recent that I sacrificed my own life in a successful bid to stop ZAFT's superweapon, GENESIS, only to return to life hours later..._

_"Yet it also feels so long since I wove the deadly dance of combat, reveling as the blood sang in my veins, performing with ease maneuvers a normal human being would find impossible. So long since I was in battle... I don't enjoy killing -despite rumors to the contrary- yet every cell in my body aches for a fight. For that is why I was created, the reason my father created the single surviving member of the subspecies _Homo Sapiens Modifica Extremis. _I was born to fight, and deep down, the frustration builds..._

_"Of course, more has been happening than just me getting frustrated -and you can probably attribute that as much to politics as to biology. It's been a busy time since then; since Flay left the _Dominion_'s crew, and subsequently disappeared; since the Justice was recovered by my people, only to be stolen by my clone, Jack Carter. My life has finally achieved the peace I sought for so long; the once-empty Onishi Mansion is full of life again, with its prodigal son returned, and Reverend Malchio's orphans in one wing. Not to mention Kira, Lacus, Murrue, and my old mentor Andy. Too bad Mu can't be here with us..._

_"Who am I? That's a tough question, but really the centerpiece of this book. I'm one of three survivors of the Ultimate Coordinator project -maybe four; we still haven't figured out just how much of that Cagalli was involved in- and, more importantly, I'm the survivor of ZAFT's dirty little secret._

_"Some called us the seeds of legend; and maybe that's true. But the twelve of us were neither humanity's past nor its future. A dead-end evolutionary line, the relics of the dreams of madmen. We were brought in existence by Patrick Zala, on the advice of that madman Rau Le Creuset, using the scientific brilliance of Commander Jeffrey Harris, codename Oracle. We were to be ZAFT's ultimate weapons..._

_"We really were the seeds of legend, I guess; we twelve Abaddon, the Destroyers. But that all ended, five years ago, on that day of madness and pain. The day creation turned on creator, and ten of the best friends I ever had vanished in the fury of thermonuclear fusion, at my hand... even as I tried to join them in death._

_"And now it has all led here. Today, I've returned to my birth name, and become Cagalli's bodyguard; with me is my old friend Athrun Zala, and ZAFT defector Leona Colde. Our job is to protect Orb's Chief Representative, and we do it well... well enough that there is, at last, time to tell the story of the war, of its beginnings and endings... of me._

_"My name is Kevin Onishi, but once I was called something else. And one day, perhaps the world will once again know the name... Kevin Walker."_

-Excerpt from the Introduction to _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_Every time I see that, it still gives me the chills,_ thought a young woman, in one of the Onishi Mansion's cavernous rooms; a gym, in this case. 

She was in her early twenties, with light brown hair, jade green eyes, and a height somewhat greater than that of the person she watched; at least, as of the time when his legend was at its height. She was also very, very good at her job... and the fact that she was here at all was a sign of trust.

Leona Colde was well aware that the humanoid tiger who occupied the room's center, performing a complicated kata, trusted only a tiny handful of people with the knowledge of what he was; very few outside the massive edifice he called home realized that Baron Kevin Onishi was, among other things, a zoanthrope.

She still twitched every time she saw him transform from an affable, teenage nobleman into a powerfully-built, crimson-and-black-striped two-legged tiger. Before defecting to Orb and becoming one of the Chief Representative's bodyguards, she'd never knowingly met a zoanthrope; they were common neither in ZAFT nor her native France... as far as she knew, at any rate.

Leona wouldn't have been surprised to find she'd met some before without realizing it, though. Kevin rarely gave any indication of his power, preferring to rely on the slender sword that was the iconic weapon of Orb's Fencing Prince; his used Xin-yi kung fu only when he was unarmed, or particularly irritated with someone... though he made sure to keep in top form, both in human and zoanthrope shape.

Of course, he _did_ occasionally lose track of time while he was at it, which was why Leona was here in the first place. "Excuse me, Kevin," she called, clearing her throat. "But have you noticed the time?"

The man-tiger froze in the middle of the Continuous Gem Bombardment, head cocked in an unmistakable gesture of surprise. **"Oh; right."**

He straightened, took a breath, and concentrated; an instant later, the fur, claws, and fangs were gone, replaced by a young man in black trousers and t-shirt, wearing formal boots and fingerless gloves (it hadn't taken Leona long to figure out why all his clothes were custom-tailored; normal fabric would be ripped apart by his transformations).

The youth had, like her, jade eyes; but his glowed as though with an inner light, and his sandy hair was actually longer than hers. Long ago, it had been a trademark of his... one he'd felt obliged to return to, when it became necessary to bury his wartime identity.

The hair itself framed a handsome face with an easy smile; only a few knew that the face was only half flesh, and marred by a wicked scar, usually hidden by makeup. Usually, that face bore a cheerful enough expression, if occasionally mocking.

Leona found it easy to forget that, behind that easy smile, there lay a soul of steel; behind the exterior of a cheerful, affable baron, lay the most ruthless man she'd ever met. She'd never seen his temper slip its leash, but she'd heard the stories... and knew, unlike most of the rest of the world, that the power within that lean, muscular body was potentially more than human.

All in all, she rather thought that Kevin was the most dangerous bastard she'd ever had the pleasure of knowing... even if he _did_ get lost in thought from time to time, and forget what he was supposed to be doing.

Or maybe that was just an act; she'd never met him as his alter ego, a master of disguise, blades, and guns...

Now Kevin reached for a nearby towel, and dried his face. "I guess I lost track of time," he said cheerfully. "Still, gotta keep in shape; never know when us bodyguards might actually be needed. So, we still on schedule for departure?"

Leona checked her watch. "Barely," she informed him. "If you're through trying to overstress your body, Athrun's waiting for us, with Her Highness."

The baron shook his head, picking up a long coat. "You know she hates to be called that; as much as I hate being called a Baron." Donning the black coat, he then slipped on a set of elaborate, apparently-ornamental armor over the t-shirt. Glossy black, it was clearly useless against modern weaponry... or so it appeared.

The final touch -after a pair of more formal gloves, and a rapier buckled around his waist- was a silver mask, sitting on a nearby table. Kevin picked it up, looked at it carefully... and tucked it under his cloak.

Leona watched with interest. "Still hate that thing, don't you?"

"Yes," he admitted frankly, walking toward the door. "But not as much as I hate this shadow world of politics; I'm afraid I've never been one for the indirect approach, if it could be helped."

"That's right," she agreed dryly, joining him. "You prefer something a little more blunt, like a nuclear bomb... as a number of Blue Cosmos scum found out the hard way."

The two shared a look then, of remembered pain. They'd both lost their parents to Blue Cosmos attacks; and if Kevin spat upon his father's memory, he still missed his mother... and remembered that it was their deaths that had opened the way for ZAFT to get him in their clutches.

"Actually," the baron said, after a moment," I don't think I ever used nuclear weapons on them. I've only used two nukes in my life, both against ZAFT; the most I've ever used on one of those bastards was a positron cannon."

She chuckled. "And that's not as bad as a nuke? A nuke just incinerates you; an antimatter cannon converts your entire body to energy, down to the subatomic level. I'd call that worse."

"He deserved it," he protested. "Though I suppose it would've been more fitting to use it on the other guy; but I suppose a plasma rifle was good enough."

Leona shook her head. "I guess it's true what they say: the difference between boys and men is that men have slightly louder toys."

"They also say that a soldier's job is to kill people and break things."

* * *

By the time the pair reached the rebuilt Kaguya mass driver, two people were already waiting for them, near the shuttle they'd soon use to reach the PLANTs. "You're late," the taller of the two, a fellow with blue hair and emerald eyes, remarked. 

"Sorry about that, Alex," Kevin apologized, not sounding very contrite. "Lost track of time, that's all."

Athrun Zala, alias Alex Dino, shook his head. "You know, Kevin, I sometimes wonder if you take this whole bodyguard thing seriously."

"Leave him alone, Alex," his female, blonde companion told him. "If anybody's entitled to a little slack, it's Kevin... though it _is_ about time you got here," she added.

Kevin smiled, and hugged her. "I was just making sure I was still in shape; I'll try not to let it happen again, how's that?"

"It'll have to do," Cagalli Yula Athha said with a smile. "Now come on, we'd better get going. We _do_ have a meeting to attend in the PLANTs, remember?"

"Yeah, I know..."

The four entered the shuttle, with Kevin heading directly for the cockpit; his companions weren't surprised to note that there was no one else there. "Don't you believe in flying with a copilot?" Leona remarked, then shook her head. "Never mind; I've asked you that a hundred times before, always with the same answer."

"Indeed," Kevin agreed. "Remember, Leona, I've been flying shuttles like this -well, of this general size- since I was fourteen; the day I need a copilot is the day I retire and take up sheep herding."

An uninformed observer would've thought that meant he'd only been flying for about two years; going by physical appearance, one would think the baron was only sixteen... but in actual fact, he was born on the same day as the Chief Representative, who was nineteen.

Such were the mysteries surrounding his genetic origins.

Athrun snorted. "Sheep herding? Yeah, right. I know you, Kevin; the first time one of your sheep irritated you, you'd shoot it and have it for lunch."

"Maybe not too far from the truth," Kevin conceded. "On the other hand, if I were still that quick to shoot things, there's a few politicians around here whose heads would be mounted on my wall... like Yuna Roma Seiran."

There was silence for several moments. Kevin Onishi's antipathy toward the Seiran family in general, and Yuna Roma specifically, was legendary. Nobody was quite sure what had started it -besides the traditional antipathy between their families- but it had gotten worse in recent years, for reasons that were quite comprehensible... for though Orb at large didn't quite know _why_, it was a well-known fact that he hated the Earth Alliance with a passion.

Which made him extremely hostile toward the Seiran family's notions of having a closer relationship between Orb and the Alliance.

"We're cleared for launch," Kevin said presently. "You three had better strap in. Don't want any of you hurt, eh, tovarisch?"

Cagalli nodded. "Right. See you after takeoff, Kevin." She gave him a quick kiss, before ducking back into the passenger compartment, and shooting a deadly glance at her bodyguards. "You didn't see that," she warned. "Got that?"

Leona chuckled. "Don't worry, your secret's safe with us."

Athrun shook his head. "Too bad those two can't just admit it to the world at large," he murmured. "I'm sure they'd be a lot more relaxed if they could."

Strapping into a seat, she frowned. "I admit that I've never quite understood _why_ they can't," she said, careful to keep her voice low enough that Cagalli couldn't hear. "I mean, they're both Orb nobles, so why...?"

"Politics," he replied with a shrug. "I don't fully understand it either, but politics dictate everything they allow to show in public. So for now, they can only be Chief Representative and bodyguard to each other... a fact which, unfortunately, seems to be making Yuna Seiran a little too bold."

Leona looked at him sharply. "You don't think he'd try to make a move towards _her,_ do you?"

Athrun sighed. "I don't know... but he might. I've gotten the impression, over the last couple years, that he and Kevin hate each other because they're rivals for Cagalli's affection..."

She shook her head. "If he tries that," she stated flatly, "he'll be signing his own death warrant. I haven't known Kevin as long as you have, but I _do_ know that ZAFT calls his alter ego the 'Black Asp' for a reason; he wouldn't take that lying down."

"I know, but... the Black Asp isn't here right now." He frowned. "Kevin Walker _would_ kill Yuna over that, and without a second thought. _Onishi,_ though... I just don't know."

"We're launching, people," Kevin called from the cockpit. "Brace yourselves."

* * *

At a military base in the PLANT colony known as Armory One, violet-haired ZAFT redcoat Lunamaria Hawke and brown-haired mechanic Vino Dupre drove toward one of the massive mobile suit hangars in a jeep; not the safest journey, perhaps, given the number of mobile suits that were active just then. 

"Been awhile since a base was this busy," Vino remarked, swerving to avoid a GINN Ceremonial Type. "That new ship's got everybody stirred up."

Lunamaria shrugged. "Need to stay alert, I guess; we've got a new warship and new-model mobile suits being rolled out tomorrow. Not to mention a visit from Orb's Chief Representative herself today."

The mechanic glanced at her. "Why would you care about some Earth politician visiting?"

She shrugged. "I'm not interested in her so much as her bodyguards. I hear one of them used to be with ZAFT; some woman named Leona Colde, a survivor of Spit Break _and_ Jachin. Then there's Baron Onishi, who supposedly fought with the Four Ships Alliance, and was there when Kevin Walker sacrificed himself to destroy GENESIS."

Vino snorted. "The Black Asp, huh? I suppose Onishi may've known the guy, but who cares? The best thing Walker ever did was nuke himself; don't forget the number of ZAFT soldiers he killed before finally buying the farm."

Lunamaria shot him a look, but didn't say anything. _That's right,_ she thought. _He doesn't know what Walker was; but I do. I wish I could've met the guy my sister so admired... I wish she could've seen me now, too,_ she admitted to herself. _I made it, Erica; I'm a top gun, just like you were, and even Meyrin's doing well for herself. I wish you could see us now..._

But Erica Hawke, her older sister, had been listed as "Missing, presumed dead" for nearly six years now... and in the opinion of her surviving sisters, Erica would be listed as KIA if they'd just been able to find enough pieces. Nuclear weapons tended to be rather final...

It was early in C.E. 68 when Erica had been transferred out of the regular ZAFT academy directly into some kind of special project. Her family hadn't known exactly what it was at the time, but they'd gotten occasional letters that were so carefully-worded that it was clear it was some kind of top-secret special forces unit. For six months, letters had trickled in...

Erica had spoken a great deal about her eleven teammates, in particular their young commander. _"His name's Kevin Walker,"_ she'd written once, to Lunamaria and Meyrin. _"A nice guy; only thirteen, but he acts much older. Smart, too. Even without his... call it special equipment... he runs the rest of us ragged. Even Charlie -that's Charlie Evans- can't keep up with him, and Charlie's over two meters tall. In training matches, Kevin can throw the rest of us around like we're made of feathers, but outside of simulated combat, he's actually pretty easygoing. As quick to smile as he is to throw you across the room, he rarely loses his temper... but if you ever see those glowing green eyes of his freeze, you know it's time to get out of the way. One time Mike Carnehan pulled a practical joke, and Kevin just glared at him with those icy eyes, and hit him so hard he flew ten meters across the room."_

Back then, Luna and Meyrin had assumed Erica was exaggerating, telling tall tales... but now they both knew that their sister's commander was quite capable of knocking someone flying ten meters, even when he was thirteen.

The final letter had come in late July of the same year. _"Basic training's finished,"_ Erica had written, _"and we're scheduled to start field exercises in a few weeks. In the meantime, we'll be getting leave sometime next month, so I'll be seeing you soon; and since Kevin and Rachel -that's Rachel Carver, Kevin's right-hand-girl- don't have any family, they're coming with me. You'll like them, I think; like I said before, you don't want to meet them -or any of us, for that matter- in a dark alley, but they're really good friends of mine."_

The next time the Hawke family had heard anything about Erica, it was when ZAFT Command informed them that there'd been an accident of some kind, and the entire team had been wiped out.

That blow had been part of what inspired the surviving sisters to join ZAFT themselves; partly to finish the work their sister had been training for, and partly to learn exactly what had happened, what had gone wrong. And after years of digging, they'd learned the truth.

Erica Hawke, codename Scylla, had been part of something known only as the ABADDON Project, an effort by ZAFT to create the ultimate soldiers, cybernetically-augmented warriors who could fight and destroy anything that got in their path. Their base had been located at Lagrange point Two, on the far side of the moon, and in August of 68, something had gone drastically wrong: a thermonuclear fusion device, apparently intended as a self-destruct system, had been activated, killing everyone in the base. The incident was officially ruled as an accident, despite later, confused reports that a member of the team had done it deliberately, and as far as ZAFT was concerned, that was the end of the matter.

But it wasn't, as Luna had learned through further digging. Eventually, she'd been able to determine that a certain famous -or perhaps, infamous- member of the Four Ships Alliance, the man ZAFT had posthumously awarded the Order of the Nebula and given the nickname Black Asp -as much out of fear as respect- was in fact a survivor of the ABADDON program.

The rogue _Archangel_-class Mobile Assault Ship _Dominion_ had, in fact, been commanded by the same Kevin Walker with whom Erica Hawke had once been so impressed.

And that was why Luna wanted to meet Baron Onishi. The Chief Representative would be too difficult for someone like her to approach, Leona Colde had defected only when Walker was killed, and the third bodyguard -Dino, or something like that- apparently had never had anything to do with the war at all.

_No, it's the Baron I want to talk to,_ she thought. _He must've at least _seen _Walker; the guy _was _a ship captain, so he couldn't have been exactly low-profile..._

* * *

Elsewhere at the base, redcoat pilot Rey Za Burrel watched the hovercraft carrying his nation's leader, Supreme Council Chairman Gilbert Dullindal, touch down; but the blonde-haired, blue-eyed young soldier's thoughts were elsewhere for a moment. 

When that shuttle had touched down, he'd felt something... something strange. He couldn't put a finger on it, but it felt almost like... like some kind of resonance. And, perhaps, the questing mind of an empath...

Rey shook himself, as Dullindal approached. _As if there might be an empath in the area,_ he told himself. _The only genuine empaths are zoanthropes -which aren't exactly common- and they only empath whose mind was trained well enough to taste his surroundings that way is dead..._

"Mr. Chairman," an aide said, coming out behind the Chairman. "The Chief Representative's shuttle has arrived, sir, along with her bodyguards."

Dullindal nodded. "I see. Would one of those guards be Baron Onishi?"

"Yes, sir."

He rubbed his chin. "Good. The man may be strange, but he has a... moderating influence on Representative Athha. Besides, if anyone is likely to understand what we're doing here, it's him. His close ties to Morgenroete tell me he understands the philosophy of war better than most from that nation."

* * *

"And this, ladies and gentleman, is where we get off," Kevin remarked, shutting down the shuttle's power and unstrapping. "Time to go face the music." 

Leona shook her head. "Did you wisecrack this much during the war?" she asked rhetorically. "And do you usually go that many hours in the pilot seat, without even any sleep?"

"In his day," Athrun said dryly, "Kevin could go about two weeks without it... though by the end of it, he'd be so jumped-up on stimulants he'd need to sleep for another week after that." He smiled. "He also had a short way with people who asked nosy questions or irritated him."

"So I've heard."

Before heading into the passenger compartment -and, from there, to the vehicle's hatch- Kevin reached under the pilot seat, and surreptitiously removed a pair of leather holsters, containing an ancient, well-worn pair of revolvers. To a collector, they were known as the Colt Single Action Army, chambered in .45 Long Colt. This pair, with blued steel, fifteen-centimeter barrels, and traditional wooden grips, were replacements for a set Kevin had carried years before.

And what _he_ had once called them was a way of life.

After buckling the holsters on behind his back -and under his cloak- Kevin joined the others at the hatch. "Shall we?" he asked, fitting his mask into place.

"Yeah," Cagalli agreed; but her expression was one of distaste. "Do you _have_ to wear that thing all the time? It gives me the creeps."

The baron regarded his girlfriend from behind opaque eyepieces. "I don't have much of a choice," he said quietly. "Not here, at least. You see, Chairman Dullindal knew me by sight, once upon a time; and given the circumstances of that acquaintance, I think it would be... unwise to remind him of it."

She nodded reluctantly. That was the first she'd heard of it, but there was only one "circumstance" he could be speaking of, when it came to ZAFT. The same circumstance that had, eventually, resulted in him being officially dead...

"Right," she said at last. "Let's go."

The four stepped out of the shuttle, and Athrun shook his head. "Couldn't you have worn a dress this once?" he remarked as they walked. "I mean, this _is_ an important meeting..."

"The suit is fine," Cagalli said tiredly. "And you _know_ how much I hate wearing a dress."

"Besides," Kevin commented, "I never was a big fan of that fashion style, myself." And, given who he was and what he meant to Orb's Chief Representative, his opinion carried a certain amount of weight.

He only had half his mind on the small-talk, though. There was something... _I feel something,_ he thought, stretching mental antennae. _There's someone here... someone I know. Can't be Dullindal; it's been over half a decade since I last saw him, and that was before I learned how to do this. So his presence isn't one I'd recognize... but then who _is _it?_

Kevin didn't know the answer to that question, but he also didn't detect anything immediately inimical, so he relaxed and closed his mind again. Besides, if anything _did_ go wrong, well... He might be known as Baron Onishi, Orb's Fencing Prince, today, but during the war, he'd been a gunfighter... the deadliest man alive.

Had he kept searching a moment longer, he might've noticed something odd about three nearby teenagers; since after all, Stellar Loussier, Auel Neider, and Sting Oakley weren't exactly typical tourists.

* * *

Of the three infiltrators sent to Armory One, only Auel Neider paid any attention to the VIP and her bodyguards; and he only did because he happened to glance in their direction in time to see the man with the silver mask... a mask virtually identical to the one their commander wore. 

"It's him," he murmured to Sting Oakley. "The guy that's got Captain Roanoke worried enough to send regular troops here with us."

Sting glanced briefly at the quartet. At first glance, the masked fellow didn't seem too intimidating; to be sure, his height -between one-seventy and one-eighty centimeters, he estimated- and the obvious muscle power in his lean frame made him somebody you wouldn't want to throw a punch at... but he didn't look frightening enough to justify the full platoon of regular troops who were waiting in the wings.

"He's just one guy," Sting muttered. "Why be so scared of _him?"_

Auel shrugged. "Don't ask me; it's one of the Captain's hunches, I guess. But look again: the way he moves, he's been shot at before. He can probably hold his own one-on-one; and remember the rumors about his arm."

"Rumors," Sting snorted. "If that guy had a bionic arm, Captain Roanoke would've mentioned it." He glanced at the third member of their small group. "What do _you_ think?"

Stellar Loussier, as usual, looked somewhat indifferent about the whole idea. "He's nothing," she said simply. "No threat."

"See?"

Auel frowned. "Maybe... but I still don't like the looks of this. And why does he wear a mask like the Captain's?"

Sting shrugged indifferently. "Who cares? Maybe they've got the same tailor or something. Come on, we've got a job to do; let the regular troops worry about Mr. Fencer."

As he was speaking, a car with a pair of ZAFT soldiers in it drove up next to them. "We're your ride," one of them said. "Get in; we don't have much time."

* * *

Cagalli and her bodyguards rode an elevator down toward the inhabited regions of Armory One, and she shook her head. "Of all the places for this meeting to take place," she murmured, "why at Armory One, and why the day before _Minerva_ launches?" 

Kevin shrugged. "I suppose the Chairman is pretty busy; all of ZAFT's been buzzing about this for weeks, so I imagine he feels he should be here for it." He smiled to himself. "The _Minerva..._ A fine ship, I'm sure, but I bet _Dominion_ and the old gang could take her apart."

"Two years ago, you'd probably be right," she agreed. "Back when _Dominion_ still existed, that is," she added dryly. "Kinda hard to fight a battle with scrap metal."

The Baron's face twitched imperceptibly at that, and Leona wondered why. _How could _Dominion_'s decommissioning be a sore subject?_ she wondered. _He didn't seem to have a problem when she was scrapped..._

Kevin's thoughts were rather more on the tense side. _If Cagalli ever finds out what I've been up to,_ he thought grimly, _she's not going to be happy with me. But I had no choice; this war isn't over. I can feel it..._

The quartet shortly arrived at Dullindal's office, where the Chairman himself awaited. "Welcome, Representative Athha," he greeted, standing from behind his desk. "I'm honored you came all the way up here to speak with me."

Cagalli nodded. "Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Chairman." Whatever her problems with the man's policy, she knew -rather better than Kevin- that appearances had to be maintained.

Dullindal swept his gaze over her bodyguards, and nodded to himself. _That's Leona Colde, I see... Hm; defected after Patrick made the mistake of trying to destroy Earth. That blue-haired fellow must be… Athrun Zala... and the last..._

He raised an eyebrow. "Interesting mask," he remarked. "Most people don't choose to hide their faces that way, Baron; especially not nobles like yourself. May I ask why you wear it?"

"Nasty scar," Kevin lied smoothly, "received during the war. I was piloting a mobile suit that got a little too close to a Peacemaker Force mobile armor when it -and its payload- was destroyed. I was far enough away not to explode outright... but still too close for safety." It was a plausible enough lie; and besides, he _had_ been a little too close to a nuke at Jachin Due...

Dullindal nodded. "I see. That's understandable; I suppose it's hard to get things done if your face frightens children." He turned to Cagalli. "So, what can I do for you? I imagine you didn't come all the way to Armory One simply to see our new warship."

"Actually," she told him, "that _is_ part of why we're here. Specifically... why are you using Orb's technology for something like this? The war is _over,_ Mr. Chairman; it has been since the Four Ships Alliance forced a truce at Jachin, two years ago."

He sighed. "Lady Cagalli, despite what it may look like, ZAFT is not preparing to engage in another war. These are simply defensive measures. If you want peace, after all, you must have the power to defend yourselves from those who might break that peace."

"But with this much power, you're practically inviting someone to attack you," she protested. "It makes you look like a threat..."

Kevin shot her a look; this was, regrettably, a matter in which they differed. "Sic Vis Pacem, Para Bellum," he quoted, nodding at the Chairman. "If you want peace, you must prepare for war. It wasn't Orb's weapons that caused the Alliance to attack us, two years ago," he reminded Cagalli. "It was our mass driver; and without the military power your father carefully built up, we would never have held out long enough to deny the Earth Forces their prize."

She frowned at him, but Dullindal nodded. "I see you understand, Baron. In fact, that's the sort of thing I'd have expected a comrade of yours to say. Commander -excuse me, _Captain_ Kevin Walker was of much the same opinion as you."

Kevin controlled his expression carefully, grateful for his mask. "You knew the man, Chairman?"

"Yes," Dullindal acknowledged. "A long time ago now; over half a decade. I wish he was with us now; ZAFT could use a man like him."

Behind the mask, the Baron's eyes froze; behind him, Leona wondered uneasily if the remark would cause an explosion.

Athrun had similar fears; he knew full well that his friend did _not_ like being reminded of his past, even by someone who didn't realize who he was talking to...

But their worries were unfounded. "I'm afraid, Chairman," Kevin said quietly, "that even if Captain Walker were still alive, he wouldn't return to ZAFT. I'm sure you recall the circumstances of his... precipitous departure from the organization."

Dullindal nodded regretfully. "Yes, I know; and it's certainly true that my predecessor should've kept a tighter leash on Commander Harris. Though Captain Walker's actions were... regrettable, they were also understandable. There are still some in ZAFT who harbor resentment -even hatred- for his memory, but those who know the truth of the Project have a more enlightened viewpoint."

_Yeah, and I can believe as much of _that _as I want,_ Kevin thought cynically. _But I suppose there's some truth in it; no one outside the Project had any idea of the methods that crazy bastard used to create me... and mold me into the perfectly-loyal soldier he wanted._

"Well," the Chairman continued, "that's neither here nor there. May I suggest we tour the base as we continue our discussion? I'm sure you'll find it most illuminating."

Athrun looked at him suspiciously, but said nothing; it was entirely possible Dullindal might recognize his voice, if he hadn't already recognized his face, so it would be better to be cautious.

Leona, on the other hand, had no such problems. "Why would you be so free with information?" she questioned. "Isn't that all classified?"

Dullindal shrugged. "The new ship and mobile suits will be unveiled tomorrow anyway... and I doubt any of you are spies for the Earth Alliance. Besides, we have nothing to hide."

* * *

"All right, we're in." The two "ZAFT" operatives, along with the three infiltrators, were now in a small warehouse, with several crates lying about; already present were a large number of soldiers in black commando fatigues. "There are weapons here; make good use of them." 

Auel raised an eyebrow, and popped open one of the crates. "I see... These should do nicely." Reaching in, he withdrew a pouch of knives, which he tossed to Stellar. "Make good use of them," he suggested. "If you run into the good Baron, it might be kinda fitting."

She nodded absently, while Sting dug in another box. "Assault rifles, grenades... Yeah, this should do." He turned to the soldiers who had smuggled them in. "So, what are our objectives? We got a general outline before we left, but nothing more than that; and pre-mission intelligence always leaves things out."

"Your targets are the new ZAFT mobile suits codenamed Gaia, Chaos, and Abyss," a soldier answered. "Your mission is simple: retrieve them, and destroy as much of the surrounding area as needed. The resulting chaos would be useful for your escape."

Auel nodded. "And what about those guys?" he asked, pointing at the commandos.

"Their mission is to take out one of Representative Athha's bodyguards." The soldier shrugged. "Beats me why he's a target, but your Captain Roanoke seems to think Baron Onishi is a series threat. Anyway, that's not your concern; though if you do see him, feel free to take him down."

"Understood," Stellar chimed in, suddenly looking deadly-serious. "Begin operation."

* * *

"You've been busy, the last couple years," Kevin remarked, looking over the lines of mobile suits they passed. "Building replacements for the units lost at Jachin Due?" 

"Partially," Dullindal agreed; he didn't find the notion of a "bodyguard" discussing policy as odd as he might've since Kevin was also an important government figure himself. "We also need to keep up with the new technologies; hence the _Minerva,_ and the new models we're rolling out tomorrow."

"But why?" Cagalli wondered. "There isn't a war going on right now, you know."

"True," he conceded, "but people are people, Lady Cagalli. There will never be an end to human conflict, so we must always be prepared."

Kevin nodded. "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." As they passed an observation window into another hangar, he paused. "Hmm? Isn't that...?"

Dullindal glanced at the machine the Baron was looking at. It had the distinctive head and general frame of a "Gundam"-style unit, like the war's G-weapons, as well as two wings, and a pair of unusual rifles...

"Yes, Baron," he acknowledged. "That _is_ what it looks like. As you probably know, Kevin Walker's MBF-M1000 Sturm Falke was briefly in our possession during the war. We didn't have time to analyze it as thoroughly as we might've preferred, but we _were_ able to duplicate many of its features." He nodded at the machine. "That's the single prototype of the Sturm Vogels, a mass-produced version of the Stormhawk. Somewhat simplified, it lacks the original's transformation capabilities, and its rifles are far less powerful, even in combined form, than the buster rifles. Also, it omits the Zero system; we attempted to duplicate it, but something went wrong, and nearly drove the test pilot insane."

"Nothing went wrong," Cagalli informed him dryly. "It's just that only a few pilots can use it; or so I hear."

Kevin gazed at the machine. "Even if it's inferior to Stormhawk," he murmured, "the Sturm Vogel must be a formidable weapon itself."

"It is," Dullindal agreed. "But even without the Zero system, it takes an extraordinary pilot to keep up with it. It's so maneuverable that only a handful of those tested could handle it, and there simply weren't enough to justify mass-production."

The baron nodded to himself. "I see."

He sounded strangely preoccupied, causing the Chairman to glance at him. "Is something wrong, Baron?"

Kevin ran a hand through his sandy hair. "I'm... not sure," he said slowly. "Something... doesn't feel right..." He opened his mind, "tasting" the area with his empathic senses... and stiffened. "Something's wrong," he said, certainty in his voice. "Someone just died out there-"

An alarm split the air. _"Alert! Alert! Intruder alarm in Mobile Suit Hangar Six!"_

ZAFT soldiers immediately entered the corridor, and Dullindal nodded to them. "I don't know what's going on," he told them, "but get the Representative and her bodyguards out of here. Get them to the _Minerva,_ if you can!"

"Yes, sir!"

"What's going on?" Cagalli demanded. "Why the alarm?"

Kevin quickly moved to the front as they hurried outside. "I'm not sure," he answered, still sensing the situation. "But in one of the hangars -I think the one where the new mobile suits are- a lot of people just got killed. This is some kind of commando raid..." He cursed. "Shades of Heliopolis..."

Athrun and Leona drew sidearms. "Now what?" Leona wondered. "What do we do now?"

"We get out of here, Miss-" one of the soldiers started, as the exited the building; his words were cut off by a hail of bullets that slammed into his face.

Kevin's eyes widened; there were dozens of black-clad commandos heading right at them, firing... and he sensed... _No,_ he realized. _Cagalli isn't the target... and neither is the Chairman..._

He flung himself in front of Cagalli. "Get out of here!" he ordered, an unusual bite of command in his voice. "Get her to safety!"

She grabbed his arm. "I can't leave you-"

"Yes, you can!" He glanced at Athrun and Leona, even as soldiers around them began to fall. "You two, get her out of here! I have to lead them off."

Athrun shook his head. "Wait a minute, what about-"

"Shut up and listen to me!" Kevin hissed. "Cagalli isn't their target; _I_ am! The safest thing for her is for me to stay away." He grunted suddenly, as a bullet struck him in the chest. "Go!"

"But-" Cagalli tried to get to him, struggling in Athrun's sudden grip.

"He'll be fine," the blue-haired bodyguard told her. "Now we have to get out of here!"

"Be careful, Kevin," Leona told the baron. "Don't get yourself killed out there."

"Not a chance," Kevin sold coldly. "There's a reason people say... that I can make the unsurvivable survivable." His hands darted behind his back, and whipped out a pair of revolvers. "All right, you bastards!" he shouted to the advancing soldiers. "Let's dance!"

* * *

"I can't believe we left him behind," Cagalli whispered, as Athrun practically dragged her away. "How _could_ we...?" 

"Because he told us to," he replied, wincing as something exploded nearby. "Remember: nothing is more important to him than you are," he went on. "And it's _Kevin,_ right? He'll be fine."

"Which may be more than can be said for us," Leona remarked, skidding to a stop. "Because I think _that_ is in a bad mood."

Athrun looked up... and saw that _that_ was a black mobile suit, beam rifle in hand, blasting a DINN out of the air. One of ZAFT's new models, obviously... and, just as obviously, it had been taken over by the attackers. "This isn't good," he muttered. "We can't fight something that big; the only man-portable weapon with any hope of harming that is Kevin's old plasma rifle..."

Cagalli groaned. "Now what?"

The mobile suit- it had to be the Gaia- turned its weapons against another hangar... and Athrun's eyes lit up, seeing a new ZAFT ZAKU machine tumble to the ground through the hole, upended but essentially intact. "Come on!" he called, and ran for it, Cagalli and Leona in his wake. "If we can get this up and running," he said, opening its hatch, "we can at least fight back."

"It's been two years since any of us last flew a mobile suit..." Cagalli began.

"I may be rusty," Athrun admitted, "but it's better than sitting around out there, waiting to get squished, isn't it?"

"You know," Leona murmured, "I think he has a point."

* * *

To the attackers, it must've appeared ridiculous. One man, wearing ceremonial body armor and carrying naught but a pair of antique revolvers, standing against a full platoon of soldiers. The odds against the man's survival seemed astronomical. 

Those soldiers had no idea how close they came to being utterly annihilated.

As soon as the first shot was fired, and bounced off the armor -it might appear ceremonial, but it was in fact a highly-advanced, light-weight alloy, fully capable of stopping bullets- automatic commands had surged through Kevin's mind, and he gritted his teeth as he squashed them. _No! I will not allow that to activate! Now is not the time!_

His cybernetic augmentation, long dormant, was attempting to activate itself, following automatic protocols which called for self-activation in the case of a combat situation such as this.

But he'd deactivated that cursed machinery two years before, and he wouldn't allow it to come alive today. _Too dangerous... can't reveal yet that Kevin Walker still exists..._

So instead, Kevin relied on old-fashioned technology and reflexes born of extreme genetic engineering.

He threw himself to one side, dodging a burst of automatic fire aimed for his head. "You want some of this?" he called, raising his revolvers. "Then come and get it, you bastards!"

His twin guns barked, spitting bullet after bullet, as fast as he could cock and fire the single-action weapons. Behind his mask, his right eye was glowing red, functioning in targeting mode; and soldiers began to fall. Coming to his feet, Kevin cartwheeled sideways, still firing, and a man fell with a bullet through his nose. To his left and right, his fellows dropped...

_Click._

Kevin froze for an instant, hearing that dreaded sound. He'd long known the problems with his chosen weapons, of course... but he'd never expected to face anything twelve hollowpoint bullets couldn't handle. Now he had... and a Colt Single Action Army took far too long to reload in the heat of battle.

Seeing their target clearly out of ammunition, the attacking soldiers grew bolder, advancing on him and firing aimed shots. There were still over thirty of them -without his augmentation online, some of Kevin's shots had actually missed- which meant they had a considerable advantage in numbers.

A grenade landed a meter to Kevin's right. The baron's genetically-enhanced perceptions noted it, and his genetically-enhanced reflexes catapulted him away from it... but it wasn't quite fast enough. The explosive blew, and while most of it had little effect, fragments of it ripped into his right hand, shredding the glove and the flesh beneath... and a glint of metal showed.

He bared his teeth in a snarl. "Enough playtime," he hissed. "You wanna play hardball? I'll show you what tough is like!"

Heedless of the insane odds against him, Kevin hurled himself into the mass of troops. He knew he couldn't survive, even with his armor and his genetically-engineered body... but he was determined to take as many of them down with him as he could.

The sheer surprise of his rush bought him some time, as commandos realized they couldn't shoot him without hitting each other. In the time it took them to draw knives, the Baron was among them... and the fruits of long practice in Xin-yi kung fu showed. His fists lashed out, again and again... and wherever his right hand, the metal hand, touched, there was a flash of blue, and the man he hit would drop, twitching as though charged with electricity.

* * *

Standing atop one of the hangars, a figure in black battle armor, one hand hidden by a cannon-like device, watched the confrontation. _This is absolute chaos,_ the figure thought. _This is an Earth Forces attack, obviously; and they appear to have realized Kevin is their greatest threat, whether they know _why _or not._ The figure snorted inside the helmet. _The ZAFT _I _knew would never have been taken by surprise like this. And if Arkanian were still around... these idiots would be in for a world of hurt. As it is... Kevin seems to be causing them some problems._

Of course, the battle-armored warrior realized that, under the circumstances, Kevin wouldn't be alive much longer... and that couldn't be allowed.

_Time to see if this gadget actually works as advertised._

The right arm, with the weapon on the end, came up... and inside it, a finger pulled a trigger.

* * *

A knife slash to the synthetic half of his face saved Kevin's life... much as the unknown shooter had planned. Just as he was recoiling, a streak of blue light flashed past, striking the knife-wielder in the face and effectively vaporizing his head. 

_Particle beam weapon-!_ Kevin hurled himself backwards, out of the mass of troops, just as more blasts of energy rained down, cutting down the enemy in droves. In moments, only one was left standing, and that one not for very long. The figure in black armor landed right in front of him, stared coldly through an opaque visor, and shot him in the face.

Kevin had landed in a crouch, and now he held a new weapon in his hand, produced from under his armor. Visually, it looked identical to his now-empty revolvers... but the circuitry built into told of something far different. "Who are you?" he demanded hoarsely, when the figure turned to face him. "Why- Son of a-!"

He knew that battle armor, just as he knew the weapon attached to the right forearm. He also knew... that it couldn't possibly exist.

"Neither enemy nor friend," he/she replied, voice clearly synthesized. "Merely one who dislikes the Earth Forces as much as you do... and one who thinks the world is a better place with Orb's Chief Representative and her bodyguard still alive."

_Earth Forces... Somehow I'm not surprised. Still..._ "You expect me to believe that you're 'neither enemy nor friend'?" Kevin asked harshly. "That's a Destroyer battlesuit you're wearing, with a Mark I Particle Beam Weapon... and only those with neural receptors can even get one of those suits to move. Since the capability to construct those receptors -let alone to implant them- was lost five years ago, you're a survivor of ABADDON. And I highly doubt any survivor of ABADDON would truly be interested in helping _me,_ after what happened there." His eyes narrowed behind the mask. "So which is it? That you, Arkanian? No, can't be; she always liked knives. That suit isn't Delta's style at all..."

The figure shrugged. "If you must put a name to me, you may call me Hyperion," the soldier said easily. "And, as I told you, I mean you no harm."

"Expect me to believe that garbage?" Kevin's finger tightened on the trigger. "You know who I am, you must remember me... you must remember what happened at the lab, when I blew us all away with that nuke."

"Hyperion" seemed to sigh; or so Kevin judged from the body language. "There are some who understand what happened that day, Kevin," the armored soldier said wearily. "There are some who know what Commander Jeffrey Harris, codename Oracle, did to you. What happened to us was not your fault."

"So what are you doing here today?" the Baron demanded. "And how did you get in, for that matter? The security here isn't exactly light."

Hyperion shrugged. "To answer your second question first, let's just say that certain command codes have never been purged from ZAFT computers. As to the first... I simply received word that the Earth Forces were planning an attack today, and that one Baron Onishi would also be here. So, I made arrangements." The soldier turned away. "However, it appears my mission here is done. Till next time, Commander."

The armored figure jumped away, and Kevin instinctively pulled the trigger on his weapon, sending a streak of azure light through the space Hyperion had occupied a moment earlier.

Then he lowered the weapon, tucked it away, and sagged. "Nichevo... If he'd been of a mind to kill me, I'd be dead right now..."

It was a sobering experience; Kevin was not used to facing something he was physically-incapable of taking on... but someone with a Destroyer battlesuit -and a more advanced model than what he was used to, no less- was something he couldn't have defeated hand-to-hand even with his own augmentation online...

He shook himself. Now was not the time to worry about the ghosts of his past. He had to find Cagalli, Athrun, and Leona... and hope that they were safe.

Kevin got to his feet, and ran into one of the flaming hangars.

* * *

Kira Yamato was confused by the situation he found himself in. He seemed to be under attack, by what looked like Earth Forces personnel. But what was he doing in this place? He seemed to be somewhere in the PLANTs... which didn't make sense. 

He sensed his danger, though, when his hands darted behind his back, snatched out a pair of Colt Single Action Army .45 Long Colt revolvers, and fired a blindingly-fast shot into the first man's face, shattering his faceplate and his nose... along with the skull behind it. Then he turned, fired again, and took this man in the heart.

Oddly, Kira felt exhilarated, as though he were enjoying the sudden eruption of violence. Every cell in his body was aching for a fight, he realized, leaping sideways with more power in his legs than he remembered having. He cartwheeled, coat whirling about him, and took a bullet to the chest. But the armor he wore wasn't the decorative ornamentation most people assumed; it was instead an advanced body armor, capable of withstanding far more than that.

He shouted something he didn't quite make out, and turned to see... Cagalli, Athrun and Leona Colde?

Kira sat bolt upright in his bed, realizing it had all been a dream... or had it? Closing his eyes again, he concentrated on the images before his mind's eye... and realized whatever he'd been seeing in his sleep was still going on.

He finally understood. It wasn't a dream... it was a telepathic sending, slightly distorted by his subconscious, from Kevin. His friend probably didn't even realize he was doing it, but it gave Kira a perfect view of what was clearly a disaster in progress.

He stumbled out of his bed, and made his way outside the Onishi Mansion, to the beach down below. Gazing up at the night sky, he wondered what was going on up there... what could've gone wrong. It was supposed to be a peaceful, diplomatic mission, a routine meeting with Chairman Dullindal. They hadn't been expecting trouble.

Now Kira knew they'd been wrong, and he felt despair, realizing that everything they'd fought for, two years ago, was in danger of being lost again. Even as Kevin Onishi wove his deadly dance at Armory One, others must be in the midst of preparing for war...

He was oblivious to the world around him, immersed in Kevin's thoughts, feelings, and experiences, when he felt a hand on his shoulder. "Kira?" Lacus Clyne said softly, concerned; she'd seen him leave, and followed him to see what was wrong. "What is it?"

"Something's gone wrong up there," Kira whispered. "Kevin's fighting, in the PLANTs; someplace called Armory One. I don't know what it is, but he's shooting people right now."

She gasped. "What could've happened?"

"I don't know." He concentrated on the images, trying to understand what was happening. "I think they're Earth Forces; or at least Kevin seems to think so. Some kind of raid..." He looked at her. "It's like Heliopolis, all over again..."

Lacus swallowed. "How are those three doing?"

"I think they're fine, for now; Athrun and Cagalli don't seem to be hurt, anyway. And Kevin..." Kira shrugged. "He's having fun."

She tilted her head, almost as concerned by that as by the news of the attack itself. "How can he be having fun at a time like this...?"

"Don't blame him, Lacus; you know as well as I do what he's been going through since the war. Peace... isn't what he was meant for." He slowly shook his head. "Kevin doesn't enjoy killing... but fighting is what he was _meant_ to do. He's spent almost half his life on the battlefield, and... I think it frustrates him, being in peacetime so long. He doesn't like to kill, but he _does_ like to fight. It's..." He shrugged helplessly. "It's a part of him, of how he's built."

Lacus nodded sadly. "You're right, I know... I wish it wasn't so, but you're right." She gazed up at the stars, as though trying to see the battle for herself. "But at least we know that Cagalli and Athrun are in good hands..."

"Has he activated his augmentation?" Murrue Ramius asked, coming up behind them; she, too, had noticed Kira's departure, and overheard part of their conversation.

Kira shook his head. "No, he hasn't; but then, I don't think he has to. He _is_ shooting people, though." He frowned. "I didn't know Kevin still carried a gun."

"I did," _Archangel_'s old Captain informed him. "Last year, I noticed his extra pair of Colts was missing, and asked him about it." She shrugged. "Once a gunfighter, always a gunfighter..."

"Just as long as he's careful..." Lacus whispered.

* * *

"Why does the phrase, 'out of the frying pan into the fire', just leap to mind?" Leona wondered. She was wedged behind and to the right of the pilot's seat in the ZAKU Athrun had commandeered. 

"Maybe," Cagalli replied tightly from the left, "because we're in a lightly-armed mobile suit against a new generation of G-weapon."

Athrun said nothing. His whole attention was focused on the enemy in front of him. _I wish Kevin were here,_ he thought unhappily, cautiously advancing on the Gaia. _He'd know how to handle this; if nothing else, he could tell when that pilot intended to fire..._

In the Gaia's cockpit, Stellar looked at the ZAKU curiously. "You won't get in my way." She charged at the machine, beam rifle spitting emerald darts.

Athrun grunted, sidestepped, and smashed the ZAKU's shoulder into the Gaia. The black machine, of course, had Phase-shift armor, and took no damage... but the blow was enough to knock the beam rifle flying. "Try that," he muttered.

Stellar glared. "You'll pay for that!" Her machine drew a beam saber... while one of her fellows approached the ZAKU from behind.

"Take this!" Sting shouted, using his purloined Chaos to cleave Athrun's ZAKU's left arm off with a saber of his own.

Cagalli winced. "Now what?"

"We're not done for yet." Athrun knew at least a certain amount about the new ZAKUs, and so knew to draw the machine's beam tomahawk to parry Gaia's saber. "Still... this could get ugly." _Where _is _Kevin and his precognitive machine when you need him?_

The situation was less than ideal. The three of them, in a single, mass-produced mobile suit, were facing both the Gaia and the Chaos, two top-of-the-line prototypes... and the Abyss was surely around somewhere, as well. Add to that the fact that Athrun hadn't flown a mobile suit since the Battle of Jachin Due, two years earlier...

Then a missile barrage struck Sting's machine from behind, and Athrun's head came around. "What the-"

Shinn Asuka, piloting the Core Splendor section of the ZGMF-X56S Impulse, flew into the center-stage of the impromptu battlefield. Hovering there, the torso, legs, and Silhouette pack for his machine drew together with the Core Splendor, forming a complete mobile suit... one which was swiftly holding a pair of large antiship swords, reminiscent of the GAT-X105 Sword Strike's Schwerht Gewehr.

Athrun was suitably impressed... not to mention relieved.

The Impulse snapped its blades together, to form an even larger sword. "Are you people trying to start another war?" Shinn demanded. "Because if you are... bring it on!"

* * *

Author's note: After two years on the sidelines, Kevin Onishi, alias Kevin Walker, returns to the battlefield. Soon, he must face his past… once and for all. 

Okay, after six months, Kevin Walker's second story has finally begun. As I mentioned in the notes for the latest chapter of Birds of a Feather, I've heard that Destiny might not be airing in America for a few more months yet… so I've decided not to wait for it. It means I have to work via episode synopses, but, given the changes Kevin's presence will be causing anyway, I think it'll work.

Well, let me know how the first chapter was; it might be a couple weeks before the next update (until I finish Birds of a Feather, my work will be divided between the two stories). -Solid Shark


	2. Chapter 2: A PLANT in Chaos

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"There are a few advantages to being what I am, no mistake. I didn't choose to become a cyborg, didn't choose for any of it to happen; and now I know what happens when man tries to play God. Those experiments, four years ago, have left me better able to take care of myself than any other human being who has ever lived. Few who cross me enjoy the experience..._

_"And a mechanical arm can be surprisingly useful..."_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_Pain..._

_That was virtually the entire universe, after the powerful, shocking blow delivered by the man-tiger that had just hours ago been a friend. Something horribly wrong had happened... but none of that mattered, beside the pain._

_There was blackness now, at the edges of the world; and the figure on the cold metal deck knew death was fast approaching. But then... something else occurred. The figure couldn't tell what, through the agony, but it seemed as though someone else had arrived... and the pain began to recede, as well as the darkness._

_"I'm getting you out of here," the newcomer said quietly, gently lifting the injured soldier. "We need to get out, fast. This place isn't gonna last much longer."_

_The soldier tried to focus on the face above. Sandy hair... jade eyes... Was it...? _Kevin?_ the soldier wondered._ No... the eyes... aren't as bright... Mike?

_The uninjured youth seemed to sense the wounded soldier's desire to communicate, and pressed one hand against the angular device in the palm of his burden's hand. (It's me, Mike,) he said, across the neural interface. (I know you can't talk right now; those wounds...) He shook his head. (Look, you need to conserve your strength; we're almost at the escape pod, and I don't want to lose you now. Too many have died tonight...)_

_(What's... happening?) the wounded soldier demanded. (What... went wrong? That... that was Kevin... wasn't it?)_

_(I don't know what happened,) Mike answered, (except that Kevin woke up, went nuts, and transformed into a zoanthrope. He... he killed the lab personnel. All of them. I think Delta made it, but I don't know about anybody else. Look, we don't have time to talk; this place is about to explode.)_

_The wounded soldier would've gasped in shocked understanding, had the wounds not been so severe. (He's going to...?)_

_(Yes; I think he's recovered his senses, and decided to end it all.) Mike swallowed. (He thinks he got us all, and he doesn't want to live with it.) Across the interface, the wounded soldier could detect helpless rage; rage both at their friend, and whatever had driven him to this path. (He's going to set off the fusion bomb,) Mike continued at last. (He's going to erase it all...)_

* * *

"The situation seems to have changed some," Athrun remarked, seeing the new ZAFT machine -apparently even still under ZAFT control- appear. "I didn't know about the fourth unit..." 

"It doesn't look like the attackers knew, either," Leona observed. "At least, they look a little confused to me."

He shook his head. "Amateurs," the blue-haired bodyguard muttered. "At Heliopolis, _we_ were surprised by the Strike's ability... but at least we adapted."

Chaos and Abyss appeared to exchange confused glances. "Where'd _that_ come from?" Auel wondered. "Nobody told us about a fourth prototype!"

Shinn Asuka spared no attention at all for the two; he was entirely focused on the machine before him, the Gaia. "Surrender at once," he ordered, "or I'll have no choice but to attack!" To illustrate his point, he spun the Impulse's huge double-blade, and pointed one end of it at the black machine. "What'll it be?"

Stellar's eyes narrowed. "No threat," she muttered. "None at all." Tightening her grip on her controls, she squeezed a trigger, firing a torrent of bullets from her CIWS to distract the interloper.

Shinn was less than impressed; such an attack was useless against Phase-shift armor. "You'll have to try better than that!" he shouted, and lunged forward, his antiship sword slashing down.

Auel snapped out of his momentary immobility. "I don't think so!" He charged the multiphase energy cannon in Abyss' chest, squeezed the trigger... and blinked in surprise as a pair of powerful emerald bolts blazed out of a smoke-filled hangar, intercepting and canceling the red-orange beam. "What the-!"

"Ah, ah, ah," a mocking voice called over the radio. "Mustn't interfere in battles that are none of your business, Mister Abyss. Let them play... and besides, I think you'll find I'm a much more... interesting opponent, if you know what I mean."

In the commandeered ZAKU, Cagalli's face lit up. "Kevin... he's okay..."

Sure enough, out of the smoke stepped ZAFT's single prototype Sturm Vogel... and given what machine it was based on, there was no doubt who the pilot was. Only one man had ever truly mastered the MBF-M1000 upon which the Sturm Vogel had been modeled.

Sting spun to face the new arrival. "What the- Who are you?"

An image appeared on his display, of a masked face framed by shoulder-length sandy hair. "My name is Onishi," Kevin replied. "Kevin Onishi... and you're on your way to making me angry, pal. You know what happens to people who make me angry? I kill them. TWEP, if you know what I mean."

While the two intruders sorted out how the situation had changed, Cagalli leaned forward in the ZAKU's cockpit. "I was beginning to think something had happened to you, Kevin," she said quietly. "Are you okay?"

Kevin grinned out of the screen at her. "Just fine, tovarisch; you should know better than to worry about me." Then his expression changed, and he switched languages. "But we have problems," he went on soberly, in Russian. "Not long after you guys commandeered that ZAKU, I ran into someone using portable particle-beam weaponry."

She frowned, puzzled both by his report... and the fact that he was speaking Russian; something which he usually did only when cursing... or speaking discretely. "Why is that such a problem?" she asked in the same language.

His expression was grim. "Just this: I happened to recognize the particle beam weapon in question... as well as the armor it was attached to. And it just so happens that the only people with the ability to create such weapons died five years ago... in the explosion of a multi-megaton thermonuclear fusion device."

Athrun had managed to follow most of the exchange -though his Russian wasn't as good as Cagalli's- and now he swallowed. "You mean..."

"Da. The ghosts of my past seem to have come back to haunt."

_And they _are_ ghosts, too... because I killed them._ Kevin clenched his hands on his controls. _That night of fire and horror... the night where it all should've ended._ He flexed his right hand, the metal one, remembering something else of the Project that had survived. _All this, because of them... and now the cycle seems to have started once again._ He raised his head. _I won't let that happen. If the Earth Forces are here, and they want a fight... then I'll give them one they'll never forget._

Shaking off such thoughts, he charged toward the Abyss, leading off with the Sturm Vogel's beam rifles. They weren't as powerful as the weapons of his beloved Stormhawk, but they'd do.

Abyss hurled itself to one side, and Auel glared at the Baron's machine. "You're good, Your Highness," he said mockingly, "but see how you do against a proper soldier!" He opened up with his own CIWS, ripping a swath of bullet holes in the ground and peppering the Sturm Vogel.

Kevin jumped away, cursing himself for forgetting that it really _wasn't_ Sturm Falke he was flying. "This thing doesn't have PSA, idiot," he muttered, "which means even CIWS can give you trouble. Remember that if you don't want to die..."

With Abyss distracted by the Sturm Vogel, and Chaos beginning to move in on Athrun's commandeered unit, there was nothing between Shinn and the Gaia. "I'll say this one more time," he said through gritted teeth. "Surrender, or pay the price!"

"Be quiet," Stellar said simply, and fired Gaia's rifle. "You won't interfere."

Impulse adroitly spun to one side of the emerald blast, and its huge Excalibur twirled in a circle, spinning in a lethal arc toward the stolen unit. "Oh, I'll interfere all right," Shinn hissed. "You won't like it, though."

A face appeared on his display then. _"Remember, Shinn,"_ Captain Talia Gladys reminded him, from the _Minerva, your mission is to capture those units, not destroy them. Understand?"_

He muttered an imprecation under his breath. "Captain, just how did they manage to steal those units so easily in the first place? Is our security just a wet paper bag?"

_"That's not the issue right now,"_ she said firmly. _"Just bring those mobile suits in."_

"Assuming the guy in the Sturm Vogel doesn't blow them up first," Shinn retorted. "Whoever he is, he doesn't seem interested in disabling them."

Gladys frowned. _"The Sturm Vogel's been activated? Meyrin,"_ she said, glancing at someone offscreen, _"put me through to that machine."_

Kevin hardly noticed when she appeared on his own screen; he'd just taken a graze from the Abyss' chest cannon. _I'm rusty, curse it,_ he berated himself, and only then saw the image on his screen. "What do you want?" he snapped, not looking very closely; he had other things on his mind.

_"This is Captain Talia Gladys, of the _Minerva," she replied. _"Identify yourself, please, before I order Shinn to disable _you,_ as well."_

He froze for an instant, recognizing name, face, and voice. _Talia Gladys... She's still alive...?_ "This is Baron Kevin Onishi," he said carefully, keeping a tight rein on his own voice. "One of Chief Representative Athha's bodyguards; after the attack began, I was forced to commandeer transportation. Now, do you want to chat, or will you let me help keep this situation under control?"

_"Are you a pilot, Baron?"_ Gladys said skeptically.

"I'm still alive, aren't I?" he grunted. "I flew with the Four Ships Alliance during the war; I may be rusty, but I know what I'm doing."

She nodded briefly. _"Very well, Baron. Thank you for your assistance."_

As her image vanished, Athrun's voice came over the radio. "What was up with that, Kevin?" he asked, dodging a shot from the Chaos. "You looked like you knew her or something."

"I did," Kevin replied grimly. "A long time ago, under less than ideal circumstances." He didn't elaborate; he was still thinking through the consequences of the acquaintance himself.

_The ghosts of the past really are coming back to haunt,_ he thought uneasily, pouring fire toward Auel's unit._ And there are far too many people out here today who knew me in those days..._

* * *

On the Bridge of the Earth Forces warship _Girty Lue,_ Captain Neo Roanoke frowned behind his mask. He felt something; something almost subliminal... _What is this? _he wondered. _It feels like... there's something searching..._

He shook himself. The "feeling" had vanished, and on the face of it the whole idea was ridiculous. What could possibly be "searching", and how could he tell if it was?

"Phantom Pain should be starting their run about now," Neo commented to Lieutenant Commander Ian Lee, the ship's commanding officer. "I think it's time we began our little diversion, don't you?"

Lee hesitated a moment. "We haven't heard anything from the commando team you sent in after that Orb baron," he pointed out. "You seemed concerned enough about him before beginning the operation; are you sure you want to begin without confirmation?"

Neo snorted. "Just because I was concerned doesn't mean I'm actually _worried,"_ he pointed out. "Something about the guy gives me a bad feeling, sure; but even if he _does_ survive, by some miracle, one man won't be _that_ much of a threat. Besides, beginning our 'distraction' should keep _him_ off guard, too."

Lee nodded. "Point, Sir." He looked forward. "Lieutenant, drop Mirage Colloid."

"Yes, Sir!"

The entire ship had, so far, been hidden by the cloaking technology Morgenroete's Heliopolis branch had developed during the war; it was banned by the Junius Treaty, signed the previous year, but that didn't concern Neo's superiors in the slightest.

Interestingly, had they but known it, Kevin Onishi wouldn't have been particularly disturbed, either; he was known to be somewhat cavalier where restrictions on weapons systems were concerned. Of course, he had access to something even better than Mirage Colloid...

Now that curtain veiling _Girty Lue_ from observation fell away, leaving the sleek, dark vessel in position to utterly annihilate its foes... which, in this case, consisted of an old _Laurasia_-class frigate that happened to be exiting the PLANT's harbor just head of them.

"Open fire," Neo said almost casually, and streams of emerald fury erupted from _Girty Lue_'s bow.

* * *

The sudden explosion at the PLANT's harbor came at an all-around bad moment for Kevin. One of his rifles had been aimed at the Chaos, trying to take some of the heat off his comrades, while the other directed fire toward Abyss; the rumble through the ground threw him off-balance, and one of Abyss' red-orange blasts finally got through his own defense. 

It wasn't enough to cause serious damage -merely a graze to one wing- but, combined with the effects of the shockwave, his head slammed into the side of his cockpit, cracking his mask right down the middle, breaking it in half.

In the commandeered ZAKU, Cagalli heard the baron's grunted curse. "Kevin? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he said, throwing the Sturm Vogel to the side of a scorching red beam. "My mask isn't, though; but we've got bigger things to worry about."

"That's obvious," Leona remarked in her casual manner -Kevin often thought she was like him in battle, only more relaxed- while holding on for dear life. "I don't know what just blew up, but I doubt it was anything good."

"Not a good time to talk," Athrun grunted, jumping over a shot from Chaos. "I'm a little busy here..."

Having momentarily rid himself of the distraction of the annoying Orb baron, Auel now looked to the sky and fired two quick shots from the multiphase energy cannon at a pair of DINNs; the first vanished in fire and debris, while the second continued onward for a moment, before gracefully tumbling to the ground. "Let's go, Sting," he called, beginning to move back. "That explosion was our signal to get out of here, remember?"

Sting nodded. "Right; no reason to stick around here any longer." He, too, leapt back, away from Athrun's ZAKU. "See you guys later."

Watching them retreat toward the Gaia's position, Athrun sighed. "This reminds me too much of Heliopolis," he murmured. "A commando raid, bystanders forced into a nearby mobile suit... Kevin launching a one man army assault on enemy soldiers..."

"One difference there, Athrun," Kevin said coolly, rubbing the synthetic half of his face. "Back then, I fought because I had a grudge against the attackers; this time, they actively sought me out. Something ain't right here, tovarisch."

"Things usually aren't, when you're around," Leona pointed out ruefully. "I've never been able to decide if you seek out trouble, or if trouble finds you all by itself."

Athrun closed his eyes. "Still, it's too similar... I just hope it doesn't end the way the Heliopolis raid did..." He remembered that well; so did Kevin and Cagalli. She hadn't seen much of it herself -she'd been in a shelter by that point, already ejected into space- but the then-student Kevin had seen it all, from the Bridge of the Earth Forces Mobile Assault Ship _Archangel._

_The day Heliopolis fell apart,_ the baron mused. _That drew me back onto the battlefield, and I hated them for it. And yet... if Rau Le Creuset _hadn't_ attacked that day, would Cagalli and I ever have met again? And if we hadn't... would I still be alive?_

That was a question whose answer might be forever unknown. Kevin's drive to destroy those who'd injured him might've carried him onward; on the other hand, his own sense that he was a monster might've destroyed _him_ in short order.

He shook himself. "We don't have time for reminiscing, Athrun," Kevin said sharply. "If we don't do something, and fast, we're going to be _dead_ mighty fast." He promptly kicked in the Sturm Vogel's verniers, bringing the advanced prototype into the air.

"Right," Athrun agreed. "We need to get out of here." He urged the commandeered ZAKU into a run, following Kevin's machine toward the incipient confrontation between the Impulse and all three stolen mobile suits. "The question is, to where?"

"We'll figure it out." The ex-uberwarrior had set his mind fully on the task at hand, with all six senses straining; including the one most people weren't supposed to know about, and even those who did usually couldn't detect its operation.

Leona, as it happened, could; she, through various interesting and twisted circumstances, had a faint trace of the ability herself, so she was well aware that Kevin was probing the area with his empathic abilities. _As am I,_ she thought to herself, _but I'm willing to bet he's got far greater range..._

Ahead, Shinn was still dueling with the Gaia. His huge antiship sword looked very impressive, but unfortunately Stellar wasn't easy to impress; she'd drawn a beam saber of her own, and if it was a rapier to Impulse's broadsword, well... a rapier could still divert a larger blade.

"Give it up," she said coldly, allowing the far larger Excalibur to slide down her weapon and off to one side. "You can't win."

"I'll be the judge of that," Shinn retorted through gritted teeth. "I'm not letting you get away!" He jumped back a step, raised his blade...

And dodged even farther back as a barrage of scarlet and emerald fire came down at him from above. "Stellar!" Auel called, landing slightly behind and to the right of the Impulse; Sting's Chaos landed directly opposite of him. "We're getting out of here."

From what Kevin could see, the pilot of the fourth machine was good; he made it dance around the incoming fire as though he'd been born in the cockpit. _Not in Kira's league,_ he judged, _but not bad. Better than these Earth Forces types, anyway._

Shinn realized now that he was effectively surrounded, but he didn't care. People like these had ruined his life two years before, and they were the reason he'd joined ZAFT. If nothing else... _No matter what,_ he thought savagely,_ I'm taking at least one of them down with me!_ He lunged forward, swinging the Excalibur toward Gaia once again.

Kevin, though a ground-pounder by training and inclination, had been hardened enough in mobile suit warfare during the last war to recognize the Impulse was making a mistake. "Get back, you idiot-"

Stellar watched impassively as Impulse committed to its attack... and then simply stepped to one side, and swept Gaia's foot through the other machine's legs, toppling it to the ground. "Pathetic," she said coolly. "You shouldn't have tried that."

"Good one, Stellar," Auel congratulated. "Now, let's finish this guy off and get out of here." Abyss leapt into the air, the multiphase energy cannon charging...

...Just as Athrun launched his ZAKU off the ground in a desperate gamble. "Kevin, keep the other one off us!" he called, slamming bodily into the stolen machine. The force of the impact knocked them both to the ground, threatening to shake Cagalli and Leona loose from their tenuous holds within the cockpit.

Without allowing the stolen Abyss time to recover, Athrun, acting more on instinct than experience, snatched out the ZAKU's standard-issue beam axe at the Gaia. "Us or them," he hissed, much as Kevin would've, "and I choose_ us."_

Leona, laid-back as always, chuckled appreciatively; but the chuckle died almost instantly, as Gaia nimbly sidestepped the thrown weapon, and Abyss turned its fury toward _them._ "I think we have a problem," she said conversationally, watching the big energy cannon begin to glow. "It seems to be pointed right at-"

Kevin, instincts alert as ever, and his empathic sense focused on the enemy pilots, sensed Auel's intent to fire, and reacted quickly. Not as quickly as he would have in the war, but quickly enough to shoulder-charge the Abyss from behind just as it fired. "You rotten vnyebrachnyi-!"

Auel cursed, but his shot, while slightly misdirected, didn't miss completely. Instead, it slammed into the ZAKU's left shoulder and arm, melting and smashing both arm and shield into liquified splinters.

Within the ZAKU's cockpit, Athrun fought for control, while Cagalli lost her grip, felt her head strike the cockpit's overhead, and fell into unconsciousness; on the other side, Leona also managed to hit her head, but her -slightly- more resilient body handled the impact with nothing worse than a headache. _I don't think that was a good thing,_ she thought muzzily. _In fact, I'm _sure_ that wasn't a good thing..._

Unable to continue the engagement, their commandeered machine fell back... and the Abyss turned its full attention to the Sturm Vogel. "Nobody gets in my way like that," Auel said through gritted teeth. "Why don't you just-"

"Can it," Kevin said succinctly; but he wasn't quite on the ball, himself. The murderous rage that tended to come to the fore when Cagalli was threatened was a definite liability at the moment, considering that his onboard systems construed the emotion to signify a dire situation. _No,_ he thought grimly, quashing the activation programs, _I can't afford to reactivate that when I'm surrounded by ZAFT forces..._

He struggled a moment too long. Taking advantage of the Sturm Vogel's apparent confusion, Auel drew one of Abyss' melee weapons, a beam javelin, and slashed up with the tip. The blade of pure energy bit into the Sturm Vogel's left wing root, severing it completely.

Unbalanced by the loss of one wing, the machine heeled over to its left, and almost gracefully slammed into the ground before its computers could compensate.

"Kevin," Athrun called in concern, keeping carefully back from the fight, "are you all right?"

"Yeah," the baron muttered, shaking his head in an attempt to stop the ringing, "I think I'm okay; just a headache. What about you guys?"

"We're alive," Leona told him, fighting a headache of her own, "but the Chief Representative is unconscious. I think we need to get out of here, mon ami."

Kevin's fists tightened in anger. "Reckon you're right, tovarisch," he said at last, reining in his emotions. "Let the fourth unit handle these guys for awhile. We need to find someplace to go to ground, before it all goes boom."

"Can you still move?" Athrun asked. "You look a little beat up."

The ex-soldier shrugged. "It ain't the Stormhawk, but it's not bad; she'll fly. If this were a true gravity well she wouldn't, but in a space colony, with 'gravity' only applying on the surface... yeah, I can get around. Let's go."

Carefully, staying well clear of the three hostile machines -which now chose to ignore them, since they were effectively out of the fight- the ZAKU and Sturm Vogel picked themselves up, leapt into the air, and fled to more congenial surroundings.

* * *

Gilbert Dullindal watched the battle between mobile suits with great interest, ignoring his bodyguards' attempts to pull him to safety. _Well,_ he thought, almost distantly, _at least now we know we built effective machines. I'd have preferred not to find out in quite this manner, though._

"Chairman," one of his guards said urgently, "would you please move to a shelter? It's too dangerous here. If a stray shot comes this way..."

Dullindal shook his head. "Not yet. I want to see what's going on here. Besides..." He frowned, watching the Sturm Vogel retreat from the battle. "There's something about that pilot..."

From the start, he'd thought there was something odd about Baron Onishi. Something... familiar, almost. Now he was sure of it; that flying style reminded him of someone else. _He _did_ say he flew in the war,_ he reminded himself. _Maybe I saw him at Jachin. Or..._ He stiffened. _Could it be... one of them?_

Dullindal raised a small radio to his mouth. "Are you aware of the situation?" he said without preamble.

_"Da,"_ replied a female voice, speaking in a Slavic accent; Kevin Onishi would've recognized it as Ukrainian. _"We appear to have a small problem, Chairman. I wonder how they pulled this one off? Perhaps Le Creuset taught them an inconvenient lesson, at Heliopolis."_

"That's not what I mean, Arkanian," he said, frowning. "I'm talking about the man piloting the Sturm Vogel." He turned slightly away from his guards, and lowered his voice; even now, this remained a sensitive subject. "That Baron... his flying style seems familiar. Somewhat like yours, in fact, though not identical. Could it be one of your students?"

The woman on the other end inhaled sharply. _"...It's possible,"_ she conceded at last. _"I know for a fact not all of them died during Hydra's little rampage five years ago; Mike Carnehan turned up in Banadiya during the war, and there was evidence at the time of the actual incident that he'd dragged someone else out with him."_

Dullindal nodded to himself. "Any chance of determining exactly which of them the Baron was, if any?"

Arkanian sighed. _"Nyet, Chairman. Not without more evidence than the flying style. They all started out with the same technique: mine. They developed their own idiosyncrasies, but all their piloting skills came originally from _my_ RNA sample. It could be almost any of them; their talent for disguise was extreme enough that it might even be one of the female members of the unit, for all we know. We can rule out Talos, given that _he_ was a good two point one meters tall -and he got himself squashed like a bug- but almost any of the others are possibilities."_ She paused. _"There's another possibility, too. Remember the experiments that produced, among others, the defector Leona Colde. Less extreme, and used on existing ZAFT soldiers, but possibly enough to be recognizable."_

"I wasn't aware any of the NGSF besides Colde herself survived the war," he murmured, "but I see your point. In any case... where has he -or she- _been_ all this time?"

Arkanian's reply was quiet. _"Chairman... if _you'd_ been subjected to what we put those poor souls through, would _you_ want to advertise the fact? If I were one of them, I'd have decided to lay low, maybe for the rest of my life."_

"That's not exactly what Walker did," Dullindal pointed out.

_"Hydra was never quite the same as the others,"_ she retorted with a snort. _"What that bastard Harris did to _him_ was pure, sadistic barbarism. The augmentation process was unpleasant for the others, but for Hydra it was a living hell; revenge drove him to overcome his past and destroy those who did that to him."_

He winced. "Yes, you're right. Rau's greatest error, before Jachin Due, was that young man. We may be fortunate he was confirmed dead at the end of the war."

_"Never count on _that,_ Chairman,"_ Arkanian warned. _"I did, after he blasted himself to atoms, and look what happened after that."_

* * *

_This is getting on my nerves,_ Shinn thought irritably, dodging a streak of emerald fire from the Gaia. _But at least those other two are gone; this is no place for amateurs._

Lips curling in a silent snarl, he reached up and snatched out one of Impulse's beam boomerangs, part of the standard Sword Silhouette pack, and threw it toward the Gaia, before leaping over another high-energy assault from the Abyss. Landing just after the beam passed, he cursed; several inactive mobile suits had been caught on the ground, and now existed only as fragments and blasted, melted chunks of debris.

"This has to stop," he hissed through gritted teeth, and lunged for the Gaia, which had adroitly vaporized his boomerang. "Why don't you just-" Shinn didn't both to finish the imprecation; his downward-slashing Excalibur made his point quite clear... especially when it nicked Gaia's arm, slicing off a tiny piece of armor.

Stellar frowned. "You'll regret that."

"Not as much as _you_ will," another voice chimed in, and another emerald dart drilled toward the stolen machines.

Shinn glanced up, to see a white ZAKU Phantom and a red ZAKU Warrior approaching. "Rey... Lunamaria... Good timing. What took you so long?"

"A few tons of debris," Lunamaria said, almost laconically. "We had to get it cleared off." Her machine pivoted slightly, and triggered a blast at the Chaos, forcing it back. "C'mon, let's take them down." She paused. "Oh, and by the way... what happened to the Sturm Vogel? I heard Baron Onishi was piloting it..."

"Beats me," Shinn said indifferently. "He got hit, and left; typical Orb aristocrat." He didn't bother to hide the disgust in his voice. "Forget him."

"I see..." She felt a twinge of disappointment; she'd hoped to have a chance to talk with the Baron, about her sister's commander. _Oh, well. A battle probably wouldn't have been a good time anyway. I'll have my chance._

"He's right, Lunamaria," Rey said quietly. "We have a job to do." He caught a shot from the Abyss on his shield, harmlessly dissipating the red-orange fire, and retaliated with his own weapon. His shot melted a furrow along one of Abyss' "wings"; minor, but better than Shinn had so far been doing.

Though staying alive at all against three-to-one odds wasn't bad.

In Chaos' cockpit, Sting winced. "The situation's changed for the worse," he told his comrades. "Auel, Stellar, it's time for us to retreat. There's no reason for us to stick around any longer."

"No," Stellar said stubbornly. "I'm taking this one down." She fired off another shot at Impulse, which Shinn took almost contemptuously on his shield.

Auel sighed. "If that's what you want," he said carefully, "then why don't you just go ahead and die?"

She stiffened, and something deep within her mind recoiled in terror. _D...die? N-no! I-!_ "No! I don't want to die!" Abandoning the attack with sudden alacrity, she spun around, launched Gaia into the air, and fled the area, along with Chaos and Abyss.

Lunamaria blinked in confusion. "What was _that_ all about?"

Shinn shook his head in confusion. "I have no idea."

"It doesn't matter," Rey interjected. "We've got them on the run; now let's go after them. We can't let them escape with three of our newest machines."

Impulse's obsidian-haired pilot nodded. "You're right, Rey. Let's go."

The trio of machines set off in pursuit; but Lunamaria felt something wrong in her machine, and cursed. "I can't keep up," she said in frustration. "The debris from earlier damaged my thrusters; I'll never catch up."

Shinn winced, but Rey took it in stride. "Then you'd better get to the _Minerva,"_ he said calmly. "Shinn and I will finish the job. You can't do any more good out here."

She nodded unhappily. "You're right. Sorry." Landing awkwardly for a moment, her ZAKU turned, lifted off, and headed for another area of the colony.

* * *

Elsewhere, away from the battle, the baldy-damaged ZAKU Athrun had commandeered carefully set down, next to the one-winged Sturm Vogel. Not far away, medical teams swarmed toward the ruined hangars, but that wasn't their primary concern. 

As Athrun took a few moments to check Cagalli's condition, Leona looked over at the battered Sturm Vogel. It was in better shape than their ZAKU -it was still combat-capable, after all- but it had still taken more damage than she'd expected it to, given who the pilot was. _I never thought the great Kevin Walker would be so easily taken out of the fight. But then... that _isn't_ Kevin Walker, is it? He's acting as Onishi right now, which means a very different mind set. His body is capable of the feats that made ZAFT and Earth Forces soldiers alike tremble in their boots... but his _mind_ is not._

It wasn't a comfortable thought. She'd always found the presence of the "Legendary Soldier" to be reassuring, especially in open areas ripe for assassination attempts. If he was losing his touch...

_Except that he hasn't; not entirely. He did a good job against the soldiers sent specifically after him, after all. Perhaps he let some of his old persona take over then... but hasn't been willing to do it since..._

A groan interrupted Leona's reverie, and she looked down to see Cagalli beginning to regain consciousness. "...Athrun?" the Chief Representative said groggily. "Are we... okay?"

"For now," Athrun assured her. "I think getting in a mobile suit was a bad idea, though; we're lucky to be alive, after what just happened."

She nodded, and immediately regretted it; judging from the pounding in her head, she'd taken a nasty bump. "Yeah, sounds like it... Is Kevin okay?"

"Da," Kevin himself said, from the Sturm Vogel. "Took a bump myself, but I've got a hard head." That earned him a weak chuckle; in his case, rather than referring to someone with more muscle than brains, he was just talking about the fact that his skeleton was reinforced with several interesting materials, none of which were normally found in the human anatomy. "I've had to uncover my scar, though, unfortunately."

Cagalli blinked. "Why?" Not that she had any problem with it herself -she'd once said it made him look rather dashing- but the ex-soldier had covered it up at the end of the war, to further distance his appearance from the super-soldier he'd been then.

"I told the Chairman I wore the mask because of a wound I picked up during the war," he reminded her. "And besides, right now I need to break up the outline of my face as much as I can. The good Chairman once knew me... and so did _Minerva_'s captain. I don't want to take the chance of being recognized."

She winced. "Good point." Exactly how ZAFT might react to the sudden reappearance of the Black Asp, once it's once feared opponent and dirtiest secret, was unknown, but the result probably wouldn't be good.

Leona was frowning now, thinking over the situation. "We need to find someplace safer than this," she said at last. "The middle of a battle like this is no place for us; especially not with both our 'borrowed' units in such condition. I have an unpleasant feeling about this situation as it is."

Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Sounds like you're speaking from experience, tovarisch; that was essentially my own conclusion, from what I recall of the Heliopolis incident."

She shrugged. "As you know, Rau Le Creuset was never even censured for his role in the Heliopolis collapse, or even for attacking a neutral colony in the first place, but that doesn't mean ZAFT didn't take note of the circumstances. Following the incident, the NGSF ran a simulation based around the scenario; both from the side of the aggressors and the defenders... and the third parties -like civilians- caught in the crossfire. What we concluded was that, in this sort of situation, the wisest course is to find the heaviest armor around, and hide behind it."

Cagalli managed a chuckle, despite the situation. "I'd say that's sound advice." She remembered well her own part at Heliopolis, brief though it had been. Being caught in a place where things seemed to explode at random, without even any way to fight back, was not something she wanted to experience again.

"As long as I don't have to face down a woman in uniform, carrying an automatic pistol," Kevin muttered, almost to himself. "I'd rather things not follow Heliopolis _that_ closely."

It was Leona's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Voice of experience, Kevin?"

He nodded ruefully. "I guess Murrue never told you how we first met; it wasn't exactly the most congenial of meetings. Suffice it to say that she was holding a gun on my friends, and I wasn't too happy about it. I pulled a fast one, blew her gun out of her hand..."

"...And wound up becoming her sworn brother," she finished for him. "You live an interesting life, mon ami."

"It's a little _too_ interesting right now," Athrun muttered. "So, where exactly do we find some armor to hide behind, anyway?"

Cagalli sighed. "I don't know about you, but I think there's only one choice... assuming we can find it." She looked at her boyfriend's image. "Kevin, I think the _Minerva_ is our only option... unless you think we shouldn't take the risk?"

Kevin sighed in turn; he knew what she was talking about. "I don't like it," he admitted, "but frankly, the risk of getting blown up weighs more in my mind than the risk of my cover getting blown. One death is certain, the other open to possible negotiation."

"Besides," Leona pointed out, "the Chairman himself agreed that your actions five years ago were not your fault. His influence..."

"True," he conceded. "Not that his influence will save me if someone gets an itchy trigger finger before he even finds out about it... but you're both right. _Minerva_ is our best chance of getting out of this alive."

And he'd know, too. Having lived for a long time under circumstances where his only trusted ally was a gun, Kevin Onishi -then _Walker-_ was a world-class expert on staying alive under adverse conditions ranging from space battles to firefights in abandoned underground bases.

"Whatever we do," Athrun mused, "we'd better do it fast. Something about this attack doesn't feel right; I don't think we've seen the last of them. Let's go."

Once more, the two machines limped into the air.

* * *

As his ship continued to pound a _Nazca_-class to scrap, Neo Roanoke tapped his armrest thoughtfully. "Any word yet from Phantom Pain?" he asked. 

Lee shook his head. "No, Sir, I'm afraid not. Judging from the apparent confusion within Armory One, they did succeed at least in part of their mission, but we've yet to receive any reports from them." He shrugged. "Perhaps they were delayed by something; an unexpectedly heavy counterattack, maybe."

"Hm..." Neo frowned behind his mask. _I don't like this. It's not like those three to be this late; they're too good for that. Unless..._ He glanced up. "Commander, correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't one of the Orb Chief Representative's bodyguards a ZAFT defector?"

Lee blinked at the apparent non sequitur. "I believe so, Sir; Intelligence said she was accompanied by an Alex Dino, Baron Onishi, and a woman named Leona Colde, a former ZAFT pilot who defected to Orb at Jachin Due, two years ago. Why?"

The masked captain nodded to himself. "Because she was a member of ZAFT's Next Generation Special Forces; and if she's still around, there's a chance other members of the NGSF survived. They were reputed to be tough opponents."

"That's true," Lee acknowledged. "Their equivalent to our Moebius Zero unit, if I remember right; but I thought most of them died at Alaska."

"Most," Neo reminded him. "Colde survived; others might've, as well." He stood. "Well, I don't like the looks of this. I'm heading out there myself; have my Exus prepped for immediate launch, and continue battle from here."

"Yes, Sir."

* * *

"I don't get it," Shinn muttered to himself, bringing his Excalibur down in an overhand chop at the Gaia. "How can they be so good with machines they only just stole?" 

"According to reports, the Le Creuset team pilots weren't bad at Heliopolis," Rey reminded him, firing at the Chaos, with little effect. "Maybe they were just well-briefed."

Shinn clenched his hands on his controls. "If there is, we better find it," he said angrily. "Things are bad enough as it is without people passing information to the Earth Forces."

"This is worse than just passing information," Rey said grimly. "If they succeed in taking these mobile suits... We need to retrieve the units before they have a chance to escape the PLANT. We still can't be sure they're Earth Forces, but it doesn't matter; we can't allow those machines to fall into enemy hands."

_As if it could be anyone _but_ the Earth Forces,_ the black-haired pilot thought, splattering a beam from Gaia on his shield. He did have a point; after all, who _else_ would be bothering to attack the PLANTs? _Unless it's that bastard Walker, back from the dead again,_ he thought irritably. _Always hated ZAFT so much, after all; I wouldn't put it past him._

But Kevin Walker was dead; that had been confirmed by Chairman Canaver herself, just after the war. She'd actually gone aboard the super-soldier's ship,_ Dominion,_ and seen his corpse personally. No, unless he'd come back as a ghost, this had to be the work of the Earth Forces.

That, at least, had the virtue of being marginally survivable, which Kevin Walker's wrath reputedly was _not._

* * *

The _Minerva_'s Bridge was filled with tension thick enough to cut with a knife. What was supposed to have been a calm day, with the _Minerva_'s own launching to take place less than twenty-four hours later, had been shattered by the unexpected attack; and now, with their pilots out fighting to retrieve the stolen mobile suits, the crew waited for news. 

At Communications, Meyrin Hawke abruptly stiffened. "An evacuation order has been issued for the entire colony, Captain," she said, tension warring with disbelief. "Reports are coming in of a poisonous gas release!"

Gladys closed her eyes. "They're being even more thorough than Le Creuset was at Heliopolis, almost three years ago. Any chance of this being a false alarm?"

"Not from the reports we're receiving, Ma'am." Meyrin swallowed hard. Her sister was out there somewhere, in the middle of the chaos, and doubtless in far greater danger than any on the _Minerva._ _Be careful out there, Sis,_ she thought anxiously. _We already lost Erica; I can't lose you, too..._

The captain's voice broke into her thoughts. "Any word on the Chief Representative or her bodyguards? That's not the primary concern here, but it wouldn't help the PLANTs if they were to be harmed during this attack."

Meyrin spent a minute checking, then shook her head. "No, Captain. No word of Chief Representative Athha, her guards, or Baron Onishi since they were forced to escape from the battle between the Impulse and the stolen units."

To the rear of the Bridge, an obsidian-haired man with crimson eyes, wearing a light green mechanic's uniform -ostensibly working on a malfunctioning air vent- stiffened. _Baron Onishi? But that's..._ His eyes narrowed, and his hand briefly touched a pendant that hung from his neck. It was in the shape of a sword, with blue jewels in the pommel and handguard... and a pair of winged serpents coiling around it, one crimson... one jade. _Kevin... so you've come back to the PLANTs at last, have you? It's been a long time..._

Gladys' second in command, Arthur Trine, noticed the mechanic's odd reaction. "Mister Alexander? Is something wrong?"

The mechanic, whose name tag read "Kyle Alexander", shook himself. "No, Sir," he replied, returning to his work. "I was just surprised to here that the Fencing Prince had come all the way up here; I'd heard he spent most of his time dealing with Morgenroete's affairs."

Trine shrugged, mildly surprised by the mechanic's knowledge of an Orb baron, but letting it pass. "It's true he kept to his own affairs most of the time before his disappearance five years ago, but he's been fairly active in dealing with the PLANTs since his return from... wherever... just after the war. Besides, he's always been a close friend of the Chief Representative, so it's not really a surprise that he's acting as her bodyguard."

"I guess you're right, Sir." _So that's why, Kevin. You've found someone else, have you? But do you still remember Rachel?_ "Alexander" almost chuckled to himself. _And do you have any idea that both of Erica's sisters are assigned to this ship? If you come here, you might be in for a surprise... old friend..._

* * *

Outside the PLANT containing Armory One, chaos reigned. The sudden blitzkrieg attack by the unknown warship had resulted in a scramble of all available forces, be they _Nazca_ or _Laurasia_-class ships, or various mobile suits. 

The mobile suit forces consisted mostly of old CGUEs and the slightly more modern -yet still obsolete- GuAIZ R. Against traditional Strike Daggers, the defense would've been more than adequate.

Unfortunately for the defenders, more modern Dagger Ls had been deployed instead, and they, unlike basic Strike Daggers, had the capability to equip Striker packs... and they were accompanied by a single mobile armor, which was almost more dangerous than the mobile _suits._

The Exus, successor to the famed Moebius Zero, suffered from the same problem as its predecessor: only a handful of pilots were capable of piloting the machine, such as the Moonlight Mad Dog, or the old member of the Moebius Zero squadron, which had been wiped out at the Battle of Endymion Crater, over three years earlier. This was because, like the Zero, it had remote weapons pods, in this case _wireless_ gunbarrels, equipped with beam weapons that were more than a match for most opponents. They required powers of spatial awareness that were rare among Natural and Coordinator alike, but if you had that skill, they were devastating.

Neo Roanoke had that skill.

Deploying the wireless gunbarrels around the Exus itself, Neo swept in toward the ZAFT mobile suits._ Obsolescent junk,_ he thought derisively, and sent one of the gunbarrels toward a GuAIZ R. As the weapon approached, it sprouted beam sabers from either side... sabers which bit deep into the mobile suit's torso, melting through armor, control systems, and pilot alike, before ripping out the other side with explosive force.

As his other three gunbarrels spat emerald fire at other targets, Neo felt something in his mind; almost like a click inside his skull, or a resonance... _I've felt this before,_ he thought to himself, frowning. _But where? I can't remember..._

Flying an evasive pattern that gave the enemy gunners fits, Neo shook off the peculiar sensation, and continued fighting. His aim was to create a diversion to aid his Phantom Pain pilots in their escape, and one thing was certain: having an Exus -or even an old Moebius Zero- in their midst was very _distracting_ for the ZAFT pilots.

* * *

Sighing in quiet frustration, Lunamaria Hawke brought her damaged ZAKU down to the _Minerva_'s hangar deck. She'd finally managed to return, after her ignominious departure from the battle, but she wasn't feeling too good about the whole thing. 

_On second thought,_ she thought bitterly, _maybe I'm _glad_ Erica can't see me now. My first real battle, and I have to turn around and leave because my thrusters were damaged by debris before I even _got_ to the battle._ She sighed again. _Erica wouldn't have let a little rubble stop her; she'd just rip it all away with her bare hands, then call in their mechanic -what was his name? Alec King?- to fix the machine. Or maybe just bring in Kevin Walker to smash the enemy..._

Lunamaria almost wished some of the ABADDON technology had survived; despite some of the horror stories about the Project, she truly believed that team -or at least remnants of their devices- could've made a real difference here. Like Erica...

Glancing up, she blinked in surprise, as Chairman Gilbert Dullindal enter from a side hatch, then disappear through another, heading deeper into the ship "What's the Chairman doing here?" she wondered aloud. "Oh, right; he probably wants to know what's going on, too." Not to mention that he probably wanted to track down the Orb delegation; losing the Chief Representative and her bodyguards -one of whom happened to be an important official himself- would _not_ be good for the PLANTs' relations with Orb. The emigration of Morgenroete technicians, with the accompanying influx of Orb technology, was proving to be quite enough of a strain.

She looked up again only moments later, hearing the distinctive sound of mobile suit thrusters; at least two, from the sound of it. _That's a ZAKU,_ she thought, _badly damaged from the looks of it... And that's the Sturm Vogel! But... that was put in storage because no pilot could be found that could take advantage of its capabilities without losing control of it..._

Within the Sturm Vogel's cockpit, Kevin watched the ZAFT ship grow larger in his displays with inner disquiet. "I don't like this," he murmured, almost inaudibly.

In the ZAKU, Cagalli frowned in concern. "Kevin? Are you okay?"

He nodded absently. "Yeah, tovarisch. It's just... I've never actually set foot on a ZAFT ship before. Nothing larger than a shuttle, anyway. And doing it now, after so much has happened... I just can't forget the ghosts of the past. The last time I entered a ZAFT military facility as a friend was..."

"The Project laboratory, five years ago," Leona finished for him. "Well, look on the bright side: no one who's joined ZAFT since the end of the war has any idea that ABADDON even happened, eh?"

"That's the theory, anyway," Kevin agreed. He'd made sure of that himself. During a quiet, unofficial meeting with then-Chairman Eileen Canaver, she'd agreed to suppress all remaining records of the ABADDON Project, as well as the related Serpent Head program, and the exact details of the Next Generation Special Forces' training and outfitting.

That meant that, as far as ZAFT was concerned, neither he nor his comrades had ever happened... in theory. But still...

_There are those who remember,_ he thought to himself, flexing his metal hand. _Those who remember friends who took part in the Project... and those handful of survivors from the support infrastructure... like Talia. And those from higher up who were cleared for the information... like Gilbert Dullindal..._

Kevin shook himself. "Come on, Athrun," he said wearily. "Let's get down there."

* * *

"Enough of this," Shinn snarled, rushing the Gaia. "Take this!" Reaching up with a free hand, he snatched out Impulse's remaining beam boomerang and threw it viciously toward the stolen black machine. 

Auel snorted contemptuously. "That trick didn't work last time," he pointed out cynically. "Won't help you now, either." This time, he raised the wing-like appendages on either side of his machine's body, charged the beam cannons on the ends of them, and fired streams of emerald death at the boomerang long before it reached Stellar's machine.

Shinn cursed vilely; now his only ranged weaponry was his CIWS, which would do exactly nothing against the Variable Phase-shift armor used by the new mobile suits. So, dodging to the side of another cannon blast, he keyed his radio. _"Minerva,_ it's me. I need you to send me the Force Silhouette."

_"Roger that,"_ Gladys replied, and nodded to someone off screen. _"Meyrin, get it out there."_

_"Yes, Ma'am."_

"I'll keep them busy until it arrives," Rey told him, and rushed for the Chaos, beam assault rifle in one hand, beam axe in the other.

The pair exchanged shots, while Shinn kept his Excaliburs raised in a defensive posture. He wasn't the best mobile suit swordsman out there -he'd heard rumors some of the Four Ships Alliance pilots had been able to deflect beams with their sabers- but he was good enough to pose a serious threat to anyone stupid enough to get in range of the gigantic ship-killing blades.

Auel, it happened, wasn't stupid; just overly aggressive. _I'll take out those blades,_ he thought, _and then he'll be helpless..._

He closed the range, firing as he came, and Shinn was forced to dodge around the powerful beams as best he could, until the Abyss got within reach of his blades at last. First one, then the other swept out, a spinning arc of blades that caught Abyss in the right "wing", slicing off the cannon barrels in the process.

"Idiot," he muttered, and brought the Excaliburs back for one final attack... just as Sting used another capable of his Chaos. A pair of gunbarrels detached from Chaos' back, and poured fire into the antiship swords, melting them down to hilts and almost taking the Impulse's hands with them in seconds. _"That_ isn't good..."

"The Force pack's coming, Shinn," Rey called. "I'll get him off you." Not bothering with his rifle -which, given how tricky these enemies had turned out to be, might've hit Shinn instead- he rushed forward, slamming bodily into one of Chaos' gunbarrels, slashing at the other with his beam axe.

It wasn't much of a distraction, as distractions go, but it was enough. As the Force Silhouette pack approached under its own power, Shinn ejected the now-useless Sword pack, and let the new set of equipment lock into place where the old had been. He'd never attempted the maneuver in combat before, of course, but experience in simulations had paid off.

Now, as the machine's phase-shift went from the Sword pack's red torso to the Force Silhouette's overall blue color, Shinn raised the newly-equipped beam rifle, and opened fire on the Chaos.

"Bastard," Sting hissed, falling back. "Neat trick; but you'll pay for it."

"Yeah, sure." Ignoring the threat -and Chaos- for the time being, Impulse spun around, and rushed the Abyss, ramming into it just as Auel fired his multiphase energy cannon again... and this time, when the beam's aim was thrown off, it didn't harmlessly dissipate in the distance.

"I think that's a problem," Rey said evenly, watching the red-orange fire impact on a colony wall, eat through the tough material, and melt a hole clear through to exterior of the colony. "They're going to try to escape through it, Shinn."

Even as he spoke, the trio of stolen mobile suits broke away form the fight and made a dash for the new hole. Their mission was complete, after all; now they just had to get their prizes back to their mothership.

"Then we'll follow them," Shinn said grimly, and took off in pursuit, Rey's ZAKU Phantom not far behind.

* * *

"Two mobile suits landing in the hangar, Captain," Meyrin reported. "The pair that were engaged in combat against the stolen units earlier." 

Gladys nodded. "Good; I'm glad to hear they're safe. Losing them wouldn't be good for our relations with Orb, to say the least." She frowned. "What about the Impulse? What's Shinn's status?"

Meyrin checked her displays, and winced. "He only has three hundred seconds of power left, Captain... and he just exited the colony in pursuit of the stolen units."

The captain sighed. "Then we have no choice. I realize it's a little early, but... launch the _Minerva._ We're going out there to support him."

"Yes, Captain!"

To the rear of the Bridge, Alexander's eyes narrowed. _So... you're aboard this ship now, are you? Well, Kevin, I wonder if you have any idea who's already in the hangar... if you know Erica's sister is down there. Will she recognize you, I wonder? And if she does... how will she react? Only a few of us know what happened that night, and even we don't know why; will she treat you as a murderer, or the larger-than-life figure Erica's letters led her to believe you are?_

He sighed inwardly. _And... how do_ I_ feel about it, after all this time? Nothing will ever change the fact that you killed Rachel with your own teeth; but even I don't know what drove you to that madness._ He clenched a fist. _And no matter what happens, I'm not going to act the way Mike did in Banadiya. I don't know what he was thinking, but blind vengeance is murder, pure and simple..._

Unnoticed by the Bridge crew, the man calling himself Kyle Alexander, whom Kevin _Walker_ had once known under another name, slipped out the hatch and made his way deeper into the ship.

* * *

From the ZAKU's cockpit, Cagalli, Athrun, and Leona descended with relief, while Kevin, with his bioengineered body, leapt lightly down from the kneeling Sturm Vogel. "Don't look at me like that," he said, in response to the speaking look Cagalli shot him. "I may not be in top form at the moment, but my biomods are quite sufficient to let me pull that off without breaking anything." 

"So I hear," Leona commented laconically. "Still, I'd think a demonstration of that might not be the best idea at the moment... Oh, well, I'm sure you know best, mon ami."

"He usually does," Athrun said dryly, shaking his head. "At least, that's what it seemed like during the war, back when we were on opposite sides..."

"The _first_ war," Kevin corrected him quietly. "You don't actually think hostilities are just going to stop, even if ZAFT recovers those mobile suits, do you? Besides, that attack didn't come on a whim... and it was no accident they tried to take me out in the bargain. Somebody got suspicious about matters they're not supposed to know about..."

"Hold it."

Cagalli's gaze snapped toward the ZAKU that had been in the hangar when they'd arrived; or, more precisely, toward the violet-haired young woman in a ZAFT red flightsuit, holding an assault rifle on them. The look in her eyes suggested that she wasn't afraid to use it.

"I think," Leona remarked, "that this isn't a social call."

"Quiet," the ZAFT pilot snapped. "Identify yourselves."

Kevin's eyes narrowed... and his left hand snapped up, revolver gripped in a duelist's stance, arm outstretched, body turned sideways to the woman. Unlike his meeting with Murrue Ramius, he was playing no tricks here; he merely wanted to avoid drawing attention to his mechanical hand. "I wouldn't recommend that, Miss," he said in a cold voice, allowing just a trace of Kevin Walker into his mind and motion. "Lower your weapon before I do something drastic."

"Same to you," she shot back. "You think I-"

The pilot broke off then, seeing Kevin's sudden change of expression. His face went white with shock, and his jaw dropped open. "Hawke?" he whispered. "One of the Hawke sisters?" _Oh, no... I didn't know Erica's sister had joined ZAFT..._

"That's right," Lunamaria acknowledged cautiously. Now that she thought about it, there was something... familiar about the black-clad man's appearance. _Have I... seen him before...?_

Athrun, taking advantage of the sudden lessening of the tension, cleared his throat. "Excuse me, Miss Hawke," he said carefully. "This is Orb Chief Representative Cagalli Yula Athha; I'm her bodyguard, Alex Dino."

"I am her bodyguard as well," Leona said, coming to attention and saluting in a way she hadn't in two years. "My name is Leona Colde, formerly of ZAFT's Next Generation Special Forces. And our companion..."

Lunamaria had begun to lower her weapon at the first mention of Cagalli's name, but now the rifle clattered to the deck, as her own jaw dropped. _That's... impossible... Sandy hair... and those eyes..._

Unbidden, one of Erica's first letters from the ABADDON Project came to mind. _"We found out today who's been selected as the unit's commander. A nice kid, younger than most of us, but tough and self-confident. His sandy hair's a little longer than usual; but the most distinctive feature is his eyes. I've never seen eyes that glow with an inner jade light like that before..."_

_Glowing jade eyes... But that's..._

Lunamaria swallowed, hardly even noticing the tremors beneath her feet that signaled _Minerva_'s imminent launch, for she understood now the Baron's peculiar reaction to seeing her. "I can't believe it," she whispered. "Kevin Walker...?"

* * *

Author's note: The chaos at Armory One continues to escalate; yet the chaos within the _Minerva_'s hull may have far-reaching consequences, as well, for now Kevin Walker has come face to face with the sister of one of the comrades his madness destroyed five years before, at the ABADDON laboratory... and someone else aboard the ship also remembers who and what he used to be... 

Yes, yes, I know; it's been a good four months since my last update of this story. Well, I've been a little busy with Birds of a Feather of late, and simply haven't had the time. In fact, after this I'll be back to work wrapping up BOF; but once that's done, I'll be able to devote my full attention to this story.

In the meantime, I hope the chapter is satisfactory; at the least, I expect one or two of the twists were... interesting. Anyway, let me know. -Solid Shark


	3. Chapter 3: Relics of the Past

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, and Frank Castile

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_The pain had begun to recede by the time Mike carried the wounded soldier into the shuttle, and took off from what they both knew was a doomed facility. They had minutes at best before a nuclear fusion device went off, and if they didn't hurry they would be as dead as their comrades._

_Still... "Why aren't I dead?" the wounded soldier wondered aloud, realizing only then that audible speech was possible again. "Those wounds..."_

_"My guess," Mike grunted, pouring energy into the shuttle's thrusters, "is that you got exposed to medical nano machines back there; either from Kevin or from some damaged equipment. I guess you got lucky." He cursed under his breath, guiding the shuttle through the exit tunnel. "Man, I wish Tanya was here; flying was never my specialty..."_

_"We'll make it," his companion asserted, as they burst out into open space. "We have to make it, we may be the only ones lef--close your eyes!" the wounded soldier abruptly warned, and Mike wasted no time complying._

_A brilliant flash -which, without the timely warning from their augmentation sensors, would've burned out even their eyes- came from behind, and the shuttle rocked violently in the aftereffects of the blast. "Solkin syn!" Mike blurted, imitating his -former- commander out of habit. "They weren't kidding about that bomb!"_

_"Seems excessive to just get rid of us if we got out of line," the wounded soldier said bitterly. "Maybe that place _is_ better off destroyed." A pause. "Do you... do you think Kevin survived that? Or any of the others?"_

_Mike paused for a ling moment, ostensibly making sure their flight path was level. "I don't know," he said at last. "I know Erica bought it, and I saw what I think used to be Charlie, but... Well, I wouldn't count out Kevin just yet. If anybody made it, he did. Probably Delta, too; I think she was on a trip someplace..."_

_"Yeah." His companion's eyes closed. "But... what _happened_ back there? Why would Kevin turn on us like that...?"_

_"I think I know," Mike said grimly. "And I'm not liking what I'm thinking. Remember all those scars he had, and his memory problems? We were all told that he'd run into pirates before being rescued by ZAFT, and had traumatic amnesia as a result... but now I'm not so sure. After some of the training we went through, some of the things Oracle said... I thought there was something fishy going on. The Doc practically oozed evil, remember?"_

_His companion shuddered. "You're saying ZAFT broke him," the soldier whispered. "Tortured him, wiped his memory, brainwashed him... and that was a zoanthrope transformation we saw back there, wasn't it? Chemical brainwashing doesn't work on them for long..."_

_"Right," Mike agreed. "He must've just come back to himself, and the shock of it made his mind snap." He clenched a fist. "If Kevin hadn't just eaten Oracle, I'd kill him myself..."_

_The other soldier felt faintly ill. "...Eaten?"_

_"Looked like it; wasn't much left of the Doc, anyway." Mike shuddered. "I never, ever wanna see a crazed zoanthrope again, my friend. Ever."_

_"Agreed... but I hope Kevin made it, anyway." The soldier sighed. "Where to from here, Mike? We can't go back to ZAFT, and Earth probably wouldn't be healthy..."_

_"We go to Mendel," Mike said quietly. "By now, whatever toxin that got loose there will have died to something our augmentation can handle, and it's nice and quiet there. We avoid the inhabited L4 colonies... and regroup. Let's get you back in shape, and then see what we can do to make things right..."_

_

* * *

_

"...All right, Maria, thanks. I'll keep an eye on the situation from here. Thank Kira for me, too, will you? I knew there was something wrong up there, but now I know what to look for, thanks to him. Over and out."

Frank Castile, Orb Intelligence agent, cut the connection and leaned back in his chair with a sigh, wishing idly that he could be certain his own phones weren't tapped. _Be nice to call her Murrue for a change, instead of an alias,_ he thought. _Though I suppose I have bigger problems right now. Bloody good thing Kira and Kevin have that psychic link..._

It had been a fairly relaxed two years, he reflected, gazing at his office desk without really seeing it. As soon as his wayward cousin had returned to the Orb nobility, Castile had gone to work for him as his personal spy. Kevin was, of course, quite capable of doing the work himself, but he didn't really have the time these days.

"And now," Castile muttered, "we appear to have another war on our hands. Joy. Not to mention Snake Eater..." What a bloody mess it was all turning into in a span of just a few weeks... but it was his job to sort things out.

He was just reaching for the desk's communications panel again to make some inquiries when his door suddenly opened, without any notice from his secretary. The spy stiffened, preparing to take out his frustration on a worthy target... before he stopped, seeing the gun, the blood in his outer office, and the face above the weapon.

"You," Castile whispered, his right hand surreptitiously moving beneath the lip of the desk. "But you're supposed to be dead."

"A mistake your secretary made," the visitor said calmly, walking in. "She's dead, I'm afraid; I couldn't leave witnesses just yet, and besides, she saw my pistol and went for one herself. Not smart."

"Why now?" Castile demanded. "Why show yourself after all this time?" _Stall him,_ he told himself. _Kevin has to be warned!_

"I was biding my time," the visitor replied casually. "Like many, I knew the peace between Earth and the PLANTs wouldn't last; this turn of events is the best to effect my return. Not that I haven't made my influence known already, of course. By now, you must know about Snake Eater."

"Yes," the spy said tightly, "we do. I should've known you were behind it, you bastard. Of all the geneticists in the world, only you and Hibiki had the ability... and only you had the knowledge of that warped genome. But why?" he demanded. "How can even _you_ be such a monster?"

"It had to be done," the gunman replied simply. "The failsafe always existed within him; Ulen and I knew there was a chance the boy would go bad, and so we made sure the virus was integrated during his creation, in a passive form. It needed only the right event to bring it out of latency."

"Something innocuous, no doubt," Castile growled, as his fingers closed around the grip of the Walther PPK he kept under his desktop. "Explains how it seemingly came out of nowhere. So I suppose you're just going to kill him, and take his place?"

"With luck, this war will do it for me," his visitor said easily. "If not, Snake Eater will finish the job within months, even with the augmentation he received. As I said, we knew there was a chance he'd go bad."

"He's a better man than you ever were," Castile said tightly. "How you hid it all those years... Not that it matters. You're being foolish, old man; you underestimate him. He'll survive, and one day soon, he'll kill _you_ instead. Revenge is something he's very good at, and attacking him -and killing me- will make you his highest-priority target. You have to know that."

"We'll see how good he is," the gunman told him, unconcerned. "But you won't, will you?"

"I know you're going to kill me." Castile didn't flinch at the prospect of his own approaching death; there was no time for fear. "But let me ask you this: what would your wife think of what you're doing?"

"She's dead," his visitor said, showing his first trace of emotion, "and Kevin is the reason for _that,_ too. Maybe Irena wouldn't approve, but that doesn't matter now." His expression didn't change as he raised the pistol. "What matters is that this must be done, and you won't be allowed to warn him."

"We'll see about _that!"_ Castile's hand came up with speed that would've made his cousin proud, and he pulled the trigger at the same moment as his killer.

The killer jerked as a 7.65 millimeter bullet tore through his left biceps, but he had the satisfaction of seeing his own bullet rip into his target's chest. It wasn't instantly fatal, but the spy wouldn't be around much longer, either. "Good shot, Frank," he grunted, putting away his weapon, "but not good enough. Too long at the desk, hmm?" With a grim smile, he turned, and left the office behind.

When guards and medics came in two minutes later in response to reports of gunfire, all they found was Frank Castile, slumped in his chair, breathing weakly. "Hold still, Agent Castile," a medic told him, while the armed guards spread out to find the shooter. "We're going to get you patched up..."

"Too late for me," Castile wheezed, managing a whisper. "Too late... Baron Onishi," he said, mustering the strength to grip the medic's arm. "Baron... Onishi... tell... Kevin..."

His head drooped, his hand went limp, and his breathing stopped. Frank Castile was gone.

"What was that?" one of the guards asked, coming over. "Sounded like he was trying to say something, at the end..."

The medic shook her head, bemused. "I don't know. I think he wanted me to tell Baron Onishi something, but he didn't have time to say what." She swallowed. "I... guess someone's going to have to tell the Baron, once contact is reestablished."

"Yeah." No one there relished _that_ duty. Nobody knew where the Baron had been during his three years away, but according to whisperings about the war, harming his family was _not_ a good idea...

* * *

"I can't believe it... Kevin Walker...?" Lunamaria could only stare at the jade-eyed young man who stood before her, a similar look of shock in his own eyes. "But... you're supposed to be dead..." 

"A mistake many have made over the years," Leona replied smoothly, giving Kevin a few moments to react. _And I wonder what _his_ problem is?_ "A lot of them aren't around anymore." Surreptitiously, her hand slipped into the jacket she wore, and her fingers touched the grips of the large pistol hidden within. The ZAFT pilot's weapon was still close at hand, and she wanted no accidents...

"You _are_ Kevin Walker, aren't you?" Lunamaria asked shakily, unable to tear her gaze from the distinctive glowing eyes. "Former ZAFT soldier..."

Kevin finally broke out of his own stunned stupor, and slowly shook his head. "Not anymore," he said quietly. "I'm just a man... but yes, I was once the man of whom you speak. It's been a long time, though, since ZAFT claimed my allegiance."

Cagalli looked at him in confusion. "Kevin, what's going on? How does she know you, and how do _you_ know_ her?"_

He closed his eyes, tucking his revolver behind his back. "She recognizes me, I expect, because my description is not one that many people fit; likely she heard it in letters from a relative." He sighed. "I served with her sister Erica, you see, five years ago."

She stifled a gasp. "That means..." She couldn't finish the sentence; not in front of Lunamaria Hawke. Cagalli knew perfectly well what it meant: Erica Hawke was dead... at Kevin's own hand.

"Da." Kevin opened his eyes again, and met Lunamaria's gaze. "I must say, Miss Hawke, that this is a meeting I would have preferred to have half a decade ago, before... certain things happened. For what it's worth, I'm sorry about Erica." _Not that it's worth much of anything,_ he thought bitterly. _All I can hope for is that it was quick... and I'll never know._

Lunamaria swallowed. "It's an honor to meet you, Comm- er, Baron. My sister... spoke highly of you in her letters." She paused. "Can you tell me what happened that day? How she died?"

He hesitated. "That... ah... might be a tale for a later time, Miss Hawke," he said carefully. "You deserve to know, and it's my place to tell you, but I think now is not the time. We're under attack, by what an... acquaintance of mine claimed to be of the Earth Forces."

"Yes, of course." She mentally scolded herself. _You've waited this long to hear the truth, you can wait a little longer. Besides, Meyrin needs to hear it, too._

Cagalli sighed in relief. "I guess that's settled, Athrun," she said to her second bodyguard... and then winced realized what she'd said. "I mean, Alex."

Lunamaria glanced at her oddly; there was something familiar about that name somehow... _No way... Could it be...?_

"Ahem," Leona put in, hoping to forestall the ZAFT pilot's understanding, "I believe we have a situation here. As Alex said, I'm Leona Colde, formerly of the Next-Generation Special Forces. I'm afraid Lady Cagalli is in need of medical attention, due to wounds received during the battle out there. Also, we'd like to speak with Chairman Dullindal, if possible."

Lunamaria thought about that for a moment, then nodded. "All right. I don't know about talking with the Chairman -I'll have to talk with the Captain about that- but I'll see that you get treatment at once. In the meantime, I should show you to a cabin. I realize, Baron," she said, nodding at Kevin, "that you're good in a fight, but I don't think you can do much right now. I expect both you and Commander Colde to understand that."

Leona nodded amiably, and Kevin smiled; his first since realized whom he was speaking to. "Da, Miss Hawke, we know. We've both been on the sharp end a time or too; even Cagalli's spent her share of time on the battlefield." He gestured with his flesh-and-blood hand. "Lead on."

Lunamaria nodded, and walked out of the hangar ahead of them, still feeling mildly stunned. She'd always wanted to meet Kevin Walker, but to encounter him like _this,_ after military records has shown him dead -at least twice, no less- for the past two years...?

She paused in her steps when she heard a muttered Russian obscenity from behind her. "Baron? Is something wrong?" The Chief Representative and her other bodyguards were also looking at the sandy-haired youth in concern, for he was clutching his right arm, which seemed to be spasming.

"I'll be fine," Kevin grunted. "Just a muscle spasm; I'll catch up with you in a minute."

"Um... all right..." Lunamaria wasn't strictly certain it was a good idea to leave him unescorted for even a couple of minutes... but he _was_ one of the Chief Representative's bodyguards, and they would likely have been shown the_ Minerva_ anyway... "Try not to take too long," she said finally.

"Don't worry."

Cagalli shot him a careful glance; she knew perfectly well that Kevin's right arm _had_ no muscles. A lie, obviously, probably because he didn't like people to know the arm was fake. "You sure you'll be okay?" she asked softly.

"Da," he said reassuringly. "I'll take care of this, then catch up with you. Go on, tovarisch, it won't take long."

She finally nodded; Kevin was quite capable of taking care of himself, after all. He'd done it for over a year, on Earth, when he had Blue Cosmos trying very hard to kill him. "Okay. Watch yourself, though."

Lunamaria had to chuckle a little at that. "Please, Lady Cagalli, this is a ZAFT ship; it's not like he's in any danger here."

* * *

Outside Armory One, Neo Roanoke smiled to himself as he prepared to strike. _Another new ZAFT prototype... and a ZAKU Phantom. Interesting. Well, I'm sure they're good, but they shouldn't be much of a... Huh? This feeling..._ He frowned; it was like there'd been some kind of flash in his mind. Something similar happened when he used the Exus' gunbarrels -apparently something to do with his heightened spatial awareness- but this felt more like a presence... 

"I don't have time to deal with this," he muttered to himself. "Metaphysical claptrap can wait until later." Feeding power to his machine's thrusters, he rocketed away from the colony wall heading straight for the two ZAFT machines. "Chase _my_ pilots, will you? I don't think so." Slashing across space, he deployed the mobile armor's gunbarrels around him.

In the cockpit of the Phantom, Rey froze for an instant as he felt the same flash Neo had. _What... what is this...? Is it...?_ He shook himself, and keyed his radio. "Watch yourself, Shinn," he warned. "I think there's something out here-"

Shinn's head snapped up at the warning, and he threw Impulse into a cartwheel to his right just as the Exus' gunbarrels opened up on him. "Earth Forces mobile armor," he grunted. "So it _is_ them, the bastards!" He raised his shield, splattering several bolts of emerald energy on it. "Gah, can't get a shot..."

Neo smiled to himself. "You're pathetic, kid," he whispered. "Nothing like a fellow I once knew..." He frowned behind his mask, then, as a fragment of a memory went through his mind. A teenager in black, with a cocky grin and the eyes of a killer... "Forget it," he ordered himself. "Just my imagination..."

The momentary distraction wasn't even noticed by his opponents, as the gunbarrels continued their merciless pounding under Neo's direction. "I don't know who he is," Rey told Shinn, "but he's good." He caught another blast on his shield, and cursed inwardly.

"He's not getting away," Shinn said angrily. "The other three already did; I'm _not_ letting him get away with this!" He rushed forward, only to be forced back by another hail of emerald darts against his shield.

"Don't be reckless, Shinn," Rey admonished. "You'll just get killed, understand?"

"I know what I'm doing, Rey," the younger, more impetuous pilot shot back. "I don't need lectures." He cursed then, catching another burst of laser fire on his shield. "The important thing is to just take him down, and then go after those three they stole!"

"That's true," Rey agreed, "but we need to be _careful_ about it." He caught another burst on his own shield, but took note of the direction it had come from. _There you are..._ His rifle snapped up, his eyes narrowed, and he pulled the trigger, spitting an emerald dart across space.

Neo nodded to himself in grudging respect, as his gunbarrel was torn to shrapnel. "You're not bad, kid," he murmured. "This fight looks interesting..."

* * *

Once the others -especially the ZAFT pilot- were out of sight, Kevin sighed, reached up his right sleeve, and made several adjustments to his right forearm. Immediately, the arm relaxed, and he sighed again, this time in relief._ Must've been Hyperion's particle-beam,_ he thought to himself. _Or something like that. Energy surge overloaded it; need to remember to talk to Erica about that when I switch arms again..._

The arm wasn't the only reason he'd hung back, though. He'd opened his empathic sense again, just enough to scout out the ship, and he'd felt something... strange. A presence he found almost, but not quite, familiar... like a memory he could almost recall. But who or what...?

"Do you have any idea how easy it would be for me to kill you right now, Kevin?"

Kevin instantly froze, feeling the pistol pressed against his back. It wasn't the gun that got his attention, though... but rather the voice. "I expect it would be pretty easy," he said carefully. "Under the circumstances, anyway." He didn't even think about resisting; without his augmentation online, the man behind him would blow his spine in two if he so much as twitched... and if he tried to bring it online, the man with the gun would know it long before he could finish.

"You're right," the other man agreed. "It _would_ be easy. You can turn around, by the way," he added.

Kevin did so, carefully raising his hands. "It's been a long time," he told the other, recognizing the obsidian hair and crimson eyes. "I had no idea you were still alive, comrade."

"Likewise," the man who went by the name Kyle Alexander informed him. "I knew you survived the lab, but I thought you died at Jachin. Imagine my surprise when I realized _you_ were Baron Onishi. You know what my first impulse was, when I learned that?"

"To come to Orb to kill me, right?" Kevin felt strangely calm, even though he knew the odds were good he was about to die. _Of course, if anyone has the right to end my life, it's him..._ "Why didn't you?"

Alexander hesitated. "Part of it," he said slowly, "was that it didn't seem healthy. Unlike you, I'm still loyal to the PLANTs; killing you might've made our relations with Orb... a little strained."

"Haven't lost your gift for understatement, I see," the Baron remarked. "So, what _do_ you want, after all this time? Now might not be a good time to remember old times, my friend; there seems to be a battle going on."

The "mechanic" swallowed, though his pistol remained steady. "The truth? I want to kill you, Hydra. You killed most of us that night, and tried to kill us all... and most of all, you killed my sister. How could you _do_ it?" he demanded. "She loved you..."

"You think I don't know that?" Kevin whispered, blood running cold at that barb. "I loved her, too... and I didn't want to do what I did, Basilisk," he added, finally using the codename he remembered that face using years before. "You don't know what really happened that night; no one alive does. Not even me, really. So much of that is still a blur... and I hope it stays that way."

"I'm sure," the man called Basilisk said bitterly. "For me, though, I'd dearly love to know why Rachel had to die..." He shook his head. "But if you don't remember, who does?"

Kevin didn't know how to answer that; so he turned his attention to Basilisk's name tag. "Kyle Alexander, eh? I see you're going by a different name these days... but I'm frankly surprised you can show your face on a ZAFT ship at all."

Basilisk snorted. "As far as ZAFT is concerned, we never happened, remember? You made sure of that after the war, when you and Canaver destroyed all the records." There might've been a sting in those words; Basilisk's former commander honestly wasn't sure.

"I didn't have much choice," the Orb baron who had once been called Hydra pointed out quietly. "Too many people wanted Kevin Walker dead as it was; it seemed safer to leave that persona officially dead, and bury all traces of what made him so dangerous. Besides," he added, "two years ago I was pretty sure I was the only one left. Mike died in Banadiya -after attacking me, in case you're wondering- and I had every reason to believe you and all the others died at the lab. And... there are some things in the past that should remain there. ABADDON is something the world should be allowed to forget... Alec."

Alec King flinched at the use of his true name. "Maybe you're right," he said in a low voice. "I can't argue that Oracle was dangerous; my research over the past five years has told me that much. In any case, I'm at least able to keep fighting for the PLANTs."

"So I see." Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Have to say, though, that I'm surprised to see a mechanic carrying a pistol aboard ship; is Talia really that casual about weapons on the _Minerva?_ My last captain made allowances for me, but that was a... special circumstance."

"Actually," Alec informed him with a slight smile, "I'm not really a mechanic. That's the job I usually perform -you know I'm good at it- but in reality, I'm with the Fast-Acting Integrated Tactical Headquarters these days... something Talia -Captain Gladys, I should say- isn't aware of."

Kevin looked at him sharply. "FAITH? That explains things... but only the Chairman has the authority to appoint FAITH agents. Does he know your true name? He knew us all by sight, once, just like Talia did."

Basilisk shrugged. "If he does know, he hasn't shown it. Come on, Hydra, it's been five years, and the unit only lasted six months. It'd be a lot to expect him to remember twelve faces after all this time. I mean, Captain Gladys didn't recognize _you..._ and neither did the Chairman."

"I was wearing a mask until just before I landed," Hydra informed him. "I wouldn't count on anonymity here, Alec; Lunamaria Hawke had never even seen me before, and she still figured out who I was."

Alec smiled thinly. "So you met Erica's sister, huh? Well, the younger one, Meyrin, is aboard, too. Watch yourself, Kevin, or someone might just decide to take you out."

"Like you, you mean?" Kevin tilted his head. "So, why _didn't_ you pull that trigger, Alec? I'd have been dead in an instant, if you had."

"One: because it wouldn't be good for our relations with Orb if Baron Onishi got shot dead on a ZAFT warship. And two..." Basilisk swallowed. "She wouldn't want me to..."

Kevin flinched, remembering himself the girl with features so similar to Alec's. _A girl I killed myself, the sin that I can never forget... or atone for._ Only one person alive knew how close he'd once come to a final solution to _that _guilt...

His flinch quickly turned into something else, as he broke into a sudden, violent coughing fit. _No! Not now!_ he thought, left hand darting for his metallic right forearm.

"What's wrong?" Alec demanded in sudden alarm. "Kevin, what is it?" Five years of bitter resentment and grief vanished for the moment as older imperatives kicked in. "What's happening?"

Kevin didn't answer immediately, instead tapping a code into the concealed panel on his arm. Instantly, a pressure injector dropped out of a compartment within the arm itself, and he brought it to his neck. Still coughing, he placed the injector against his carotid artery and jammed it home, releasing the contents directly into his bloodstream.

In moments, the physical reaction subsided, and he leaned back against a bulkhead. "Solkin syn," he said fervently, breathing heavily. "Bloody good thing nobody saw that..." Slipping the injector back into his arm, he closed his eyes, willing himself to relax.

"Mind explaining what just happened, Kevin?" Alec asked, crimson eyes narrow. "And don't try to tell me you've just got a cold or something. You've got the strongest immune system I've ever seen; and I never saw you react like that to _anything_ before."

"You only knew me for six months," Kevin pointed out, and then sighed. "But fine... you might as well know that you might get your revenge anyway."

"No simple disease could be doing that," Basilisk said cautiously. "Coordinators don't _get_ seriously ill, least of all you."

"It's a disease," Kevin disputed, "but it's not exactly natural. We know that, because its name is literally coded into its structure, like a signature: Snake Eater. An engineered virus, specifically designed to attack _my_ genetic code. It turned up a month ago, and we're still not sure how or why... but if we don't find either a counter-virus or a way to bring my medical nanomachines back online, I'll be dead in about eight months."

Alec frowned, and brought up his augmentation sensors. "It's attacking your central nervous system," he murmured, "where your augmentation is giving you some protection. Causing gradual cellular apoptosis... It's first trying to get through your cybernetics, so you're using mechanical nanites to keep it in check."

"Exactly," his former boss agreed. "Unfortunately, my people -experts in their fields; I effectively control Morgenroete these days- they think this is one smart virus. Eventually, according to their computer models, it'll either learn to break right through the augmentation barrier... or attack another part of my body with less protection, like my heart. When that happens, I'm a dead man. Not that I've given up; we're working on a way to cure it... and if I ever find out who did it to me, he's a dead man."

"I thought you didn't do that kind of thing anymore," Alec said with some amusement.

"That's just for public consumption," Kevin said grimly, straightening. "Nevertheless, whoever is trying to kill me will die for it." He flexed his arm, making sure it was functioning properly. "Now if you'll excuse me, Alec, I need to get moving. I've taken too long here as it is, and I frankly don't want anyone to know that I know you, at least for now."

"Likewise." Basilisk's gaze was, for a moment, worthy of the mythical creature form which he took his codename. "I've worked hard to obtain this position, humble though it may be, and I don't really want to lose it simply because I was part of one of ZAFT's dirty little secrets, five years ago."

"We think alike." _But then... we always did, didn't we, Alec? It's interesting... the Kevin Walker you knew was nothing more than a personality overlay, yet here we are, still talking to each other as we might've in the old days. Our circumstances and emotions have changed, but deep down, I truly am the same man I was back then..._

Kevin turned, and began to walk away, but his old comrade's voice made him pause. "Wait, Kevin," Alec called. "There's something... you should have." Having tucked away his pistol, he now reached up, and removed the pendant from around his neck. "Here," he said, tossing it.

The Baron's metal hand closed around it... and his breath caught as he recognized it. _Twin winged serpents, coiling around a sword..._ "This... this is..." He looked at Basilisk in shock. "This was Rachel's... how did you...?"

Alec looked away. "When I... realized what was happening, I ducked into the personnel section, and took a few things out of there before escaping." He paused. "She... would've wanted you to have it, I think." The super-soldier paused again, clearly thinking of saying more, but then turned and quickly walked away, disappearing into the depths of the ship.

Kevin Onishi, once known by the codename Hydra, didn't watch him go. He could only stand there, staring at the pendant he had last seen five years before, around the neck of a woman whose life he had taken... whose death had once brought him almost to the point of suicide.

* * *

On the Bridge, Gladys frowned. They'd finally emerged out into open space, and _Minerva _had spread her wings, but there was something else out here, too. "An enemy warship," she murmured, unsurprised. "We should've known; they'd need someplace to land those machines if they intended the theft to be successful. Designate that ship Bogey One," she ordered. "Prepare for battle." 

"Understood, Captain," Trine acknowledged.

"What about Shinn and Rey?" Gladys said next. "What's their status?"

"They're engaged in battle with a mobile armor of some kind, Captain," Meyrin answered, consulting her displays. "We can't contact them; radio interference from N-jammers is too strong in this area, probably due to that enemy ship." She frowned, noticing something odd. "Also... I'm reading something else out there, Captain, very faint, almost like a radar ghost. The computer can't decide if it's there or not; if it is, it's somewhere on the periphery of the battle area."

"Then ignore it," the Captain told her. "If it's there, and it's hostile, we'll worry about it when we can do something about it. For now..." She looked forward. "Lower the Bridge into battle position, and prepare to pursue Bogey One."

"Aye, aye, Captain."

Behind her, Gilbert Dullindal stroked his chin thoughtfully. "Are you planning to recover the stolen mobile suits first, then?"

Gladys nodded. "Shinn and Rey can take care of themselves, Chairman. For now, we're going to fire on Bogey One, and try to lure it closer. Sooner or later, they'll try to use those three machines against us, and we can retake them that way, or we'll simply disable the ship itself and retrieve them directly. Prepare to fire Tristan cannons and launch Neidhardt missiles," she added to her crew.

Dullindal nodded to himself as _Minerva_'s weapons deployed, and surreptitiously touched a throat microphone linked to the radio he'd used earlier, at Armory One. "Do you read, Delta?" he sub vocalized.

_"Da,"_ Arkanian replied laconically. _"Wonderful things, quantum radios; they bypass even N-jammers. Pity I can't thank Minotaur. So what is it, Chairman? I'm a little busy cleaning up in Armory One right now; I'm the only one who can get through the gas those vnyebrachnyi left behind without a protective suit."_

"We're engaging the enemy right now," he told her. "But that's not my area. I wanted to ask you if you had any idea which of your students that was out there."

Delta hesitated. _"Is this an urgent question, Sir?"_ she asked carefully.

"He's aboard right now."

That gave the woman pause. _"I'd call that urgent,"_ Arkanian said at last. _"Be very careful, Chairman; if you say the wrong thing about our mutual past, the Baron _will_ kill you, and I won't even blame him in the slightest. His temper is uncertain where we are concerned, and it's probably fortunate I didn't come aboard with you."_

"Then you _have_ identified him," Dullindal stated. "Or is it her?"

_"It's him,"_ she said unhappily. _"Mind you, I'm delighted that he's still alive; ZAFT owes him a great deal for Oracle's mad deeds."_ She sighed. _"Shine some ultraviolet on his left hand if you want proof: you'll see three snake heads set at one-hundred-twenty degrees apart. One of the twin serpents of the ABADDON program, and without a doubt the more dangerous of the two."_

Gladys interrupted momentarily, with her own command. "Open fire!"

Beams and missiles streaked across space, and Gilbert Dullindal nodded to himself in understanding. "The Hydra is back."

_"Da. Remember why he received that codename, Chairman: cut off one head, and two more take its place. He won't die as long as he has a reason to live."_

"Poetic, but not exactly helpful, Natalya Ivanova."

_"Don't be so sure,"_ Kevin Walker's teacher warned her leader. _"I know that man. Playing games with him is playing with fire. Keep it up too long, and you burn. Put all your cards on the table when you see him, Chairman, or you may well die."_

_

* * *

_

Even as _Minerva_ opened fire on Neo Roanoke's _Girty Lue,_ an armored figure watched from the edge of the battlezone. Safely hidden by optic camouflage, inactive engines -which thus had no thermal signature; and even if they had been active, they were shielded- and a radar-absorbent outer skin, a small fighter craft hovered well outside range of the two combatants... and the mobile weapons that fought another battle not far from there.

In the cramped cockpit of the one-man craft, the armored soldier known as Hyperion watched with interest. _Do I intervene?_ Hyperion wondered. _Or just sit back, and watch for a while longer..._ Several moments were spent contemplating that question, and then the armored head shook. _No. Not yet._ The ABADDON survivor had decided years before that he would intervene immediately if Kevin's life were directly threatened, but independent action would require direct orders from Hydra himself.

If such orders were received, however, Hyperion _would_ obey. Even after five years and a lot of spilled blood, Hyperion would obey Kevin Walker's orders without question. As, the super-soldier suspected, would any other survivor.

_Even Alec,_ Hyperion thought with a slight grimace. _He might not realize it himself, but if Kevin gives the word, we _will_ come to his aid..._

If that word were to come now -which it wouldn't, of course; Hyperion had noticed Kevin's augmentation, and thus also his radio implant, was offline- the small fighter could react swiftly and decisively. A simple mental command would bring the craft's powerful weaponry online, and another command would send it screeching across space at accelerations that would kill a normal man.

But for now, Hyperion merely waited, for the order that might or might not one day come...

* * *

Completely unaware of the presence of the super-soldier's fighter, Shinn continued his assault on the enemy mobile armor. "You blasted Earth Forces bastards!" he shouted, pulling out one of his beam sabers. "Why do you have to keep this up, huh?" 

Neo watched him come, and nimbly twisted his Exus away. "Not bad," he granted, "but not good enough, either, kid." His finger tightened on his trigger, and the pair of linear cannons mounted on the mobile armor's nose spat hypervelocity shells at the ZAFT machine.

Impulse boosted to the right to avoid one, and slapped the other aside with his shield. "You're not taking me that easy!"

""He's right about that," Rey commented more sedately. Another emerald dart splattered harmlessly against his shield, and he leveled his own rifle. He waited a beat, as the factors came together, and slowly squeezed the trigger...

As with a properly-fired sniper bullet, the burst of light came as a surprise, and the laser blast flickered across space to intersect with the same location as a gunbarrel, punching in one side and out the other, leaving shattered and melted metal in its wake. The punctured gunbarrel hung there for a moment, and then blew itself apart, spewing debris through space.

Neo noted the loss of his remote weapon, and shrugged. _Hm. This could be going better..._ His remaining pair spiraling around each other, spitting emerald death at Rey's ZAKU.

"I don't think so!" Shinn shouted, rushing forward. "You're not getting away!" He swung out with his beam saber, feeling a rush of adrenaline as he realized he was in range to hit the mobile armor. _Now I've gotcha!_ he exalted in his mind.

"I don't think so!" With a burst of speed, the Exus shot _past_ the Impulse, leaving the beam saber to cleave nothing but engine exhaust, and pulled around in a classic Immelman turn. "I think it's time I got out of here," Neo muttered to himself, recalling his gunbarrels just before another beam from Rey could immolate a third. "I've done my job; no need to get greedy... and not smart, either."

"Come back here!" Shinn called after the retreating mobile armor. "I'm not finished with you!"

"Let him go, Shinn," Rey told him calmly. "This isn't over yet; we'll get him next time. For now, let's get back to the _Minerva._ Besides, we're almost out of power."

"...You're right," the hotheaded pilot grudgingly admitted. "Let's go."

The two machines retreated from what had just been a battlefield... and as they did, a relic of ZAFT's dark past -a relic of _Kevin Walker's_ past- lit off its engines, and quietly faded away.

* * *

On _Girty Lue_'s Bridge, Ian Lee watched _Minerva_'s fire come on with the detached calm of a combat veteran. "Hard to port," he ordered. "Thirty degrees left ascension, thirty percent acceleration. Set Igelstellungs to missile defense." 

The hard maneuver brought the Earth Forces ship up and out of the firing line of the _Minerva_'s Tristans, and the _Girty Lue_'s CIWS tracked around, spitting a stream of gunfire at the Neidhardt missiles, shattering them well short of the ship herself. _That should hold them for a little while,_ Neo's exec thought to himself. _Now we just need to retrieve Captain Roanoke, and get out of here..._ The three infiltrator-pilots had already landed, so there was no reason to remain in the battle area any longer than was necessary to recover _Girty Lue_'s captain.

"Captain Roanoke's mobile armor has landed, Sir," an officer reported. "He's taken damage, but is unhurt."

Lee nodded. "Good. Prepare to get us out of here. We probably shouldn't remain here any longer than we have to, with that new ZAFT ship out there."

"Incoming fire! ZAFT ship is targeting our engines!"

"Twenty degrees to starboard," he ordered. "Ready cannons for return fire."

"Negative," Neo countermanded, entering the Bridge. "We've done our job. One hundred and eighty degrees about, maximum thrust; we're withdrawing."

"Aye, aye, Sir." The helmsman quickly moved to obey the order, bringing _Girty Lue_ hard about in space, even as the _Minerva_ spat another burst of emerald energy at them. "Withdrawing."

"Prepare to jettison propellant tanks one and two," the masked captain went on. "We'll use them as a diversion while we escape. And put visual records from those three units on my screen; I want to see how that battle went inside Armory One."

Lee glanced at him. "Something up, Sir?"

"I don't know," Neo said honestly. "But I have a hunch, Ian. There's something about this situation that I don't like; I _don't_ think the two I fought out there were enough to account for the delay those three experienced getting out of there. I want to see _exactly_ what they were facing."

"Understood." Actually, Lee wasn't sure he had the faintest idea what his superior was talking about, but Neo Roanoke _did_ tend to know what he was doing. If he thought it was important, it very probably was. "Jettisoning propellant tanks now, Sir."

"Now," the masked captain murmured, "will they react as I think they will? Whoever's in command of _that_ ship is a sharp customer..."

On the main screen, showing a view aft, the twin tanks spun silently out into space... directly into the path of the_ Minerva_ and her guns. The ZAFT ship instantly ceased fire and began to turn away... but not before the propellant tanks erupted in silent fire, vomiting flames and debris out into space.

"And that's that," Neo said in satisfaction. "Get us out of here."

"Aye, aye."

With his ship now retreating safely from the battlezone, Neo turned his attention to the battle records that now played on his screen. _Hm..._ he thought, watching as first a ZAKU, then the Impulse, and eventually some strange machine he wasn't familiar with engaged the units his pilots had stolen. _That third machine... it looks like the records from the last war, of the Stormhawk... piloted by the assassin Kevin Walker..._

That was one thing that the Earth Forces _were_ sure about from the war: the identity of the pilot of a certain mobile suit capable of destruction on an unprecedented scale. He wasn't the best pilot out there, but records showed he'd been pretty good, and his mobile suit had been nothing short of exceptional. And, according to rumor, it had once briefly been in ZAFT's possession, which explained the unit the _Girty Lue_'s pilots had fought.

_The only question is... who is that pilot? One of the Next-Generation Special Forces, or something else...?_ He frowned, wondering about it. Not only did the machine seem absurdly familiar -as if he'd seen the original Sturm Falke in person somehow, which was preposterous- but the _flying style_ was hauntingly familiar, like a ghost returned to the battlefield.

_Maybe it's someone who flew in the last war,_ he reasoned. _I'll have to check the records when I have the time. This is important, I can feel it..._

_

* * *

_

"Well, _that_ was a mess," Shinn groused, pulling himself out of Impulse's cockpit. "We failed to stop those thieves, and almost got shot up by a _mobile armor_ of all things! They'll pay for this, I swear..."

"It wasn't entirely one-sided," Rey reminded him, exiting his own cockpit. "The mobile armor was damaged during the engagement, and the stolen units _fled,_ remember? They were frightened off, not just escaping. I'd call this one a draw."

"A draw... Well, next time it'll be decisive," the black-haired pilot muttered. "I won't let them get away with this..."

"Hey, Shinn!" Vino called. "You okay?"

"Yeah," his fellow mechanic, Yolant Kent, chimed in. "That looked like a nasty fight out there; you still in one piece?"

"I'm fine," Shinn said dismissively. "It'll take more than that to hurt me." He glanced around the hangar, and frowned briefly when he noticed a black-haired mechanic beginning work on the Sturm Vogel. "Hey, Alexander," he called. "What are you doing?"

"Starting repairs, Mister Asuka," Alec King replied, not bothering to turn away from his work. "This unit took some bad hits out there; better get started now, while I have the chance."

"Why bother?" Shinn demanded. "It was piloted by that worthless baron; and how'd it get here in the first place? Last I saw, he was running like a coward."

Alec stiffened almost imperceptibly. "He wasn't running," he said carefully, "he was making a strategic withdrawal in the face of overwhelming odds... in order to do his job, which happened to be protecting the Chief Representative of Orb. That led them here, which is how _it_ came to be here. And I'm repairing it, Mister Asuka, because from what I've heard we'll need all the help we can get."

The pilot frowned at the sharp reply; he wasn't used to hearing the usually quiet mechanic talk like that. "...Whatever," he finally said. "Just don't waste _too_ much time on that thing. We don't even have anyone that can fly it assigned to this ship, and relying on somebody like that baron would be a big mistake. They're all the same, those aristocrats..."

Shinn continued on his way, still muttering imprecations about Orb and its nobility, and Alec went back to his work, shaking his head. _Idiot,_ he thought to himself. He most definitely had his problems with his own former commander, but he was objective enough to consider what Kevin himself had likely gone through... and more importantly, he was devoted to the ship he served aboard. Alec knew the best chance for _Minerva_ to stay in one piece was for every machine to be up and flying, and he knew better than most that Kevin would be a valuable addition to the ship's defenses.

_I don't know if I can trust you, Kevin, but I know I _can_ trust you to protect this ship as long as Chief Representative Athha is aboard. And I'd rather see you out there than Shinn Asuka any day. That punk would never have made it through _our_ training..._

The notion actually amused the super-soldier. If Shinn had served under Kevin Walker's command, being trained by him and -especially- Delta Arkanian, he'd have either gotten discipline or gotten spaced. Either one would've been an improvement, as far as he was concerned.

* * *

The propellant tanks exploded, covering Bogey One as she fled the battlezone, and Talia Gladys leaned back in her chair with a sigh. "That might've gone better," she said quietly. "But it could've been worse. At least we took no casualties." She turned to look at Dullindal. "I'm sorry, Chairman, but I'm afraid we won't be able to let you off anywhere; we're going to have to hurry if we want to catch them." 

He shook his head. "Don't worry about it, Captain. The recovery or destruction of those mobile suits must take priority; allowing them to remain in the hands of the enemy would be far too great a risk. As it is, we approach a renewed war far too swiftly."

"Agreed; and with no Four Ships Alliance to try to head it off this time." Gladys closed her eyes. "Many of them don't even exist anymore; _Archangel_ vanished after the war, _Dominion_ was reported scrapped, and Kevin Walker has been dead for two years..."

Dullindal frowned slightly. _Don't be so sure,_ he thought to himself. _I haven't yet seen him... but if Arkanian believes it was Hydra flying the Sturm Vogel, then I believe her. However, Kevin Walker, I think I'll let you reveal your secret in your own time. If I know you, you won't be content to remain in the shadows for long; that's not your style, and there are too many people who know you anyway..._

"Stand down from battle stations and return to normal operations," Gladys commanded her crew. "Light up the engines, three-quarter thrust. We're going after that ship"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Is everything all right?" Rey asked, entering the Bridge. "I thought there was an explosion..."

"A diversion," Dullindal said dryly. "The enemy vessel ejected some kind of propellant tanks into our path, and used the subsequent detonation as cover to escape. We're undamaged, though; they won't get far."

"Exactly," Gladys concurred. "And now... Rey, please escort the Chairman to a cabin. I have a feeling this isn't going to be a short journey."

"Of course, Captain," Rey agreed at once. "Your Excellency?"

The Chairman nodded, and moved to follow the blonde pilot; but he paused, hearing Gladys' intercom chime._"Captain?"_ Lunamaria said from the speaker. _"We have four additional passengers; they claim to be the Chief Representative and her bodyguards."_ She forbore to mention -over the intercom, at least- the stunning revelation of the Baron's identity. _"They requested medical treatment and an audience with the Chairman, so I had them treated and escorted them to a cabin. What do I do with them now?"_

"Let them rest, for now," Gladys told her. "They are who they say they are; I spoke with Baron Onishi myself, during the battle. Under the circumstances, I expect they need the rest."

_"Understood, Ma'am."_

"It's as well that they're aboard, Captain," Dullindal pointed out. "The situation at Armory One is still chaotic; if they'd stayed behind, they might well have been dead by now. Except, perhaps," he added thoughtfully, "for Miss Colde. I don't think anyone entirely understands the results of the treatments they underwent, but it may be that she's immune to the nerve agent used there."

"She has some of _his_ genes, Chairman," she said quietly, too low for most on the Bridge to hear. "And I know _he_ was immune to all known chemical weapons. How much of that was genetic and how much cybernetic is impossible to know at this point, though."

"True." Dullindal shrugged. "I suppose I should be getting out of your way now; planning a battle isn't my place."

* * *

"What happened back there?" Cagalli demanded, when the four of them were safely behind a closed cabin door. Ever sensitive to her bodyguard's -and boyfriend's- moods, she knew _something_ had occurred before he rejoined them. 

The pendant he cradled in his hand was proof enough of that.

"I haven't seen you this shell-shocked in a while, Kevin," Athrun agreed. "Not since... I don't know. Kira may've seen you like this within the past few years, but _I_ haven't."

"I met a ghost back there," Kevin said at last, almost inaudibly. "Another ghost of my past, but this one more tangible than the mysterious Hyperion." He looked up, meeting Cagalli's worried eyes. "The second of ABADDON's serpents... Basilisk. That was Alec King's codename, five years ago, and so it's somehow fitting that he survived, as well."

Her eyes went wide. "Alec King? Another of the Destroyers? But... I thought they were all dead. I mean, I know about Hyperion, but the rest of them... Mike Carnehan died in Banadiya two years ago, and I thought the rest died at the lab..."

"So did I," Kevin murmured. "But you know... I only killed four of them personally, that day. Only Erica, Simon, Charlie... and Rachel were killed by my teeth and claws. The others I presumed were killed in the nuclear explosion, but I never actually checked. Hard to, really, since a fusion blast doesn't leave much behind... and since none of them ever resurfaced anywhere else, except for Mike..."

"It's been five years, Kevin," Leona noted. "That was a fairly reasonable assumption in my opinion, erroneous, apparently but reasonable. On the other hand, it stands to reason that any survivors would try to distance themselves from the project; even you only revealed yourself when your hand was forced."

He shook his head. "I could've hidden it longer, Leona; the real reason I dropped the charade was because vengeance became more important to me than stealth. And besides... it was a tale that needed to be told. My comrades deserved better than to be forgotten by history... even if only a few of us remember them."

"So what's this Alec King doing now?" Athrun asked. "And where'd you get that pendant?"

"He's acting as a mechanic at the moment," Kevin answered. "It's what he does, besides fighting; he was the team engineering specialist. However, that's just a cover. He's actually a member of the Fast-Acting Integrated Tactical Headquarters unit, though what a FAITH agent is doing here, I honestly don't know. He didn't tell me, and I didn't ask. As for this pendant..." He swallowed. "A long time ago, it belonged to someone very close to me. Alec took it out with him when he escaped, and gave it to me a few minutes ago because, he said... she would've wanted me to have it."

"That was Rachel Carver's, wasn't it," Cagalli said softly; it wasn't a question. "I'm sorry, Kevin... It must hurt, having all this brought back after so long..."

"It's not easy, I'll admit," he agreed. "That night, five years ago... it's not something I like to remember. On the other hand, I'm glad to have something of hers... and I shouldn't forget them. Whatever might've come between us in the end, those men and women were my friends." He clenched his metal fist suddenly. "But what I want to know is... why are these ghosts of the past coming back now? Two years it's been since I killed the last man responsible for what happened to me, and now relics of that dark past are suddenly coming out of the shadows." He consciously loosened the cybernetic appendage, forcing himself to relax. "I guess... that the hand of Fate is upon us once again."

"Figures you'd say that," Athrun muttered uneasily; the last time "Fate" had taken a hand, it had been in a series of conflicts between Kevin and himself, one of which would have resulted in Athrun's death had Cagalli not intervened. "Speaking of hands," he went on, glancing at Kevin's, "what happened to yours? I hadn't noticed before, but your right hand..."

Kevin shrugged. "Close encounter with a hand grenade; blew off the synthetic flesh to just above the wrist. I'll probably get the rest off later, too, easier to replace it all than just a part." He smiled slightly. "Don't worry about it; you should see the other guy. I'm pretty sure the grenadier was the first guy Hyperion blasted with that PBW." He sighed. "This metal hand of mine... another symbol of the war. I think we're about to be involved in something big, tovarisch; this won't end just with three stolen mobile suits."

"Agreed," Leona said, almost casually. "Seems we can't escape our own natures, eh, mon ami? War begins again, and we just happen to be on hand for it..."

Cagalli closed her eyes. "I thought it was over," she whispered. "I thought... the Junius Treaty meant an end to all this. Both sides were moving toward _peace,_ you know? And now this... now war is a possibility again, after only two years of peace..."

"It was always a possibility, love," Kevin said gently. "As long as there are people, there will always be war. I agree, though, that there's something odd about this action. Hyperion told me they were Earth Forces, and I believe that, but _why?_ The timing..."

"The timing could've been worse," Athrun pointed out. "It doesn't make much _sense,_ but at least they struck at a time when we could _survive_ being involved. A few minutes one way or the other, and..."

"Yeah. But..." The Baron's jade eyes narrowed, and he looked down at his hand again. "Do I have any _right_ to be involved again? After everything that's happened, is it my place to take part in this war, as well? Two years ago, my war ended..."

"This is our war as much as ZAFT's," Leona informed him, understanding better than the others, through their shared background, how the youth felt. "In the first place, it's our war because we're aboard the ship that's chasing the stolen units; if she's destroyed, so are we, which makes things rather personal. Besides... perhaps I should remind you of something _you_ said once, that Colonel Kisaka told me about: this is Orb's war, because Orb's citizens and holdings have been attacked. Well, just citizens in this case, I suppose, but your old point stands." Her own jade eyes sharpened. "And remember this, mon ami: neither of us can escape our own genetic legacy. As your father gave unto you the seeds of your future in your creation, so did ZAFT instill them into me. We are the same, you and I, and we are both bound up in the Fate our genetics have given rise to."

"Now wait a minute," Cagalli protested, "your genes don't determine your future; and is this philosophy, or something that will actually do us some good here?"

"Genetics gave rise to the situations that determine our future," Kevin told her. "Were it not for the warped genetic code the late Baron engineered into me, I would never have become part of ABADDON, and Leona would never have been with the Next-Generation Special Forces. For that matter, the NGSF would never have existed. No, our genetics have had a major impact on our futures, Cagalli."

She sighed. "I knew you'd say something like that... So what do you intend to do?"

"I don't know," he replied honestly. "That depends in part on Chairman Dullindal. But I _refuse_ to just sit by and die."

* * *

Ian Lee sighed, leaning back in his chair. "We seem to have escaped, Sir," he said quietly. "Do you think they'll pursue us, though? We may have fooled them for now, but..." 

"I don't know for sure," Neo said pensively. "But we'll proceed on the assumption that they will. We stole three of their new prototypes, and they'd be fools not to try and get them back or destroy them before we can analyze them. Also..." He paused, frowning behind his mask. "There's something else going on here, Ian. Another factor in this battle. None of our commandos returned from the attempt to assassinate Baron Onishi, and that bothers me."

"They might've run into ZAFT Special Forces," Lee suggested.

"No, I think there's more to it than that. The commando leader got off one last transmission before going off the air, and the last things he reported were that the Baron was fighting with surprising skill for a nobleman... and that they were under attack by what seemed to be particle beam weaponry."

His exec frowned. "Obviously Baron Onishi has had more extensive training than Orb admits to. But what's so odd about particle beams? They're not as destructive as more common beam weapons, but it's entirely possible ZAFT equipped some of their mobile suits with them."

Neo shook his head. "You're not getting it, Ian. According to the message, no mobile suit was in the area. Apparently, they were being fired upon by man-portable energy weapons."

Lee started. "But no one's ever perfected a particle beam weapon of that size... unless..."

The masked captain nodded. "There were rumors, remember, of ZAFT's so-called 'super-soldier' program, ABADDON; some reports claimed they were working with highly-advanced technology, beyond that of regular ZAFT or the Earth Forces. The loss of the commando unit, as well as peculiar readings I was getting during my battle outside Armory One, tell me that there's a third faction involved here. I don't know exactly who -for all I know, it might be the so-called 'Black Asp' himself- but something about this situation makes me uneasy."

"Hm." Lee thought about that, then shrugged; if his superior thought it worth worrying about, it probably was, but he himself didn't have enough of the facts. "So, what about our pilots?" he asked, changing the subject. "Are they all right?"

"They're fine," Neo assured him. "Sleeping it off in their regeneration chambers. The only problem came when Auel was forced to use Stellar's block word; we might have to make some judicious changes to her memory. Other than that, they're all in perfect health."

"Huh." _Girty Lue_'s exec shook his head. "I don't like relying on people like them," he said quietly. "Putting soldiers like them on the battlefield..."

"They do their jobs," Neo reminded him. "In case you didn't notice, they succeeded in their mission against greater odds than a full platoon of commandos faced, and the none of the commandos survived going up against just one or two people. Besides, they're better than the last batch; at least these three can follow orders and not shoot each other when they get mad." From what he'd read of the records, the first three had shot at each other almost as much as the enemy, and were undisciplined in the extreme.

"I guess you've got a point, Sir." _But I still doubt their usefulness..._

_

* * *

_

In the hours following the surprise attack on Armory One, the atmosphere aboard _Minerva_ had finally begun to relax from the turmoil of combat to the more familiar tension of the chase, and now Dullindal finally had the time to speak with the ship's accidental passengers.

He was waiting for them when they arrived, as was Captain Gladys. Before he could say a word, however, Gladys frowned, looking at Kevin. "You've lost your mask, Baron," she remarked. "Did something happen? I'd heard you needed medical treatment..."

Kevin shook his head, and glanced at Cagalli. "Not me, just the Chief Representative here. My mask was, unfortunately, destroyed during the battle, but all I ended up with was a bad headache. Believe me, Captain, I've endured far worse than headaches."

Behind him, Cagalli tensed, realizing what this encounter might well lead to; and Dullindal smiled inwardly. _And now we come to the crux of the matter,_ he thought to himself. _Hm... will she recognize him herself, or will the good "Baron" seize control of the situation and reveal it first? Knowing Hydra... Hmm._

Gladys now tilted her head, looking at the Baron more closely. "You... look familiar somehow," she said carefully. "Had we met before today, Baron...?"

Kevin smiled faintly, and took his time answering. Instead, he first reached into a pocket under his cloak, and withdrew a pack of, of all things, cigarettes, which earned him an odd look from Cagalli. Pulling one out with his left hand, he struck it against his right, lighting it against the metal, and stuck it between his teeth; he was, after all, immune to both addiction and lung cancer. "Hello, Talia," he said finally, still with that faint smile. "Long time no see, hm?"

The captain stared in shock. Now she began to recognize the voice... and the way he held the cigarette... and even the brand. The subtly altered accent combined with the mannerisms to call to her mind memories from years before, of another sandy-haired, jade-eyed young man... or was it the same one? An image formed before her mind's eye of a youth in a white uniform, with sandy hair, jade eyes, a cocky grin... and the same brand of cigarette, held in exactly the same manner.

"It... can't be..." Gladys whispered. "You... you died, over five years ago! And... again, two years ago, in the destruction of GENESIS... You _can't_ still be alive! Not after all that. Not even Kevin Walker!"

Cagalli winced, and even Athrun looked pained; though Leona remained as relaxed as ever. _Hm; knew it would happen something like this. Kevin must be having fun... Didn't know he smoked, though. Old habit he never mentioned?_

Kevin, for his part, was utterly unperturbed. "Amazing what a change in accent and a simple face mask can do to disguise one's identity," he remarked. "Not to mention being dead a time or four, just to make things confusing. Yes, it's me. I won't die, Talia," he told her, echoing words he'd spoken to Natarle Badgiruel, two years before. "Not until that time arrives." He chuckled softly at her expression. "You don't need to fear me, Talia; I'm not a ghost, and your involvement in the Project was too brief for me to seek vengeance against you." He shrugged, and blew smoke, before putting out the cigarette with his metal hand and stuffing it into a pocket. "Most of those people are already dead."

The captain felt more than a little shell-shocked. She'd long believed every relic of that Project to be long dead; to see their leader, the strongest of them all, standing before her now, was something of a shock. "No one ever guessed you were Baron Onishi," she managed at last. "Half a decade, and no one realized you were from Orb at all, let alone the head of one of the Five Noble Families... Hiding in plain sight..."

"It seemed prudent to let my wartime identity remain officially dead," he told her. "Too many enemies. Unfortunately, one of your pilots, Miss Lunamaria Hawke, still recognized me with letters that her sister Erica sent, so my cover's blown anyway. Yes, the Hydra is still alive... though I'd appreciate it if you not call me that. I shed that skin long ago."

"For which I can't blame you," Dullindal assured him, speaking at last. "I doubt anyone still living knows exactly what happened to you, but if the rumors were true..."

"They were." The smile was gone, and Kevin's jade eyes had gone cold and pitiless. "But those directly responsible for what happened are all dead now."

"So I gather." The Chairman nodded at the former ZAFT soldier. "I'm sorry you and your companions were dragged into this, Commander... I suppose I should make that 'Baron', under the circumstances. At any rate, I'm afraid we're all in this for the duration; there isn't time to let even _me_ off."

Cagalli nodded. "I understand, Chairman. But... do you have any idea who the attackers were, or how they knew about the new machines?"

"It's still under investigation," Dullindal replied. "It's only been a few hours, remember; we don't yet have any data on the identity of the raiders."

"Garbage," Kevin said flatly. "I know exactly who they were, and so, I suspect, do you."

The older man looked at him curiously. "Oh? Do you have information I don't, Baron?"

"I ran into someone from the old days," Kevin informed him bluntly. "I don't know which one -with that battlesuit, it was impossible to tell- but he _was_ one of us, and he informed me that the attackers were Earth Forces. Given the platoon of commandos that attacked me directly, I'm inclined to believe him. The Earth Forces always _were _cozy with Blue Cosmos, and Blue Cosmos has long wanted _both_ my personas dead. ZAFT, by contrast, only had problems with their own wayward soldier... and besides, you had every reason to believe Kevin Walker to be dead. No, only the Earth Forces had a motive for attacking me, and only the Earth Forces would have a motive -and the ability- to steal your new prototypes. If the Impulse had been kept with the rest, it would almost certainly be in their hands now, as well."

"Probably true," Dullindal conceded, with a slight frown. "You were told this by another survivor of ABADDON? Hm... perhaps that part of the past isn't as dead as we all thought."

"It will never be truly dead," the Baron said quietly. "Not as long as its legacy lives on in my body, and the other products of that twisted experiment."

"True enough." The Chairman sighed. "At any rate, we don't have the time to ponder the matter, I'm afraid. We have to stay on top of this problem, or else it'll become much worse. We can't afford to let them escape." He turned to Cagalli. "In the meantime, Representative Athha, would you and your bodyguards care for a tour of the ship? I'm sure you'd find it most enlightening."

Gladys frowned. "Are you sure that's a good idea, Chairman? This _is_ a warship, with classified technology..."

Dullindal smiled ruefully. "I don't think that's going to be an issue much longer anyway, Captain. Whether we deprive them of those mobile suits or not, some of the technological data _is_ going to get out. Think of it as a gesture of good will between two friendly nations. And besides... the Baron here could extract any data he wanted from the computers, if he so chose."

Kevin blinked. "What? Patrick Zala had countermeasures made against neural interfacing in Jachin Due's computers; don't you have those here, as well?"

Gladys coughed lightly. "Actually, I believe the designers decided that, since the last known survivor of ABADDON perished two years ago, there was no need for such countermeasures. Premature, perhaps, but a reasonable assumption..."

He snorted. "They obviously didn't reckon with a certain assassin friend of mine. In any case, you can put your mind at ease, Talia; my augmentation has been offline since the end of the war, and I have no intention of reactivating now. Too many bad memories."

"Quite," Dullindal agreed. "Shall we?"

* * *

"I never thought we'd have passengers like _this_ aboard," Lunamaria remarked to Shinn, as she watched mechanics work on her ZAKU in the hangar. "I mean, wow..." 

"What's so special about them?" Shinn asked, in a friendlier tone than he used with others. "I'd heard someone was aboard, but all I know is that the good-for-nothing Baron Onishi is here, and I don't see anything special about_ him."_

"The Chief Representative of Orb is here, Shinn," she told him, lowering her voice. "So are her bodyguards One of them's a known ZAFT defector, Leona Colde, and that Alex Dino... Shinn, I think... that he's really Athrun Zala."

He looked at her sharply. "Athrun Zala? _The_ Athrun Zala? Son of the former Supreme Council Chairman? But he hasn't been seen since..."

"Think about it, Shinn. He came here with the heads of two of the Five Noble Families; if anyone could get him a new identity, those two could. And..." Lunamaria lowered her voice even more. "_All_ of Representative Athha's bodyguards are ex-ZAFT, Shinn. Leona Colde, Athrun Zala... and Baron Onishi used to be with the Special Forces. Shinn, he's really Kevin Walker!"

Shinn's eyes went wide. _"Him?_ The guy your sister served with? But... he's dead..." His voice hardened abruptly. "And he's a traitor."

She blinked. "Huh? What are you talking about?"

"Haven't you heard the stories? About ABADDON's end..."

He trailed off, for at that moment the four Orb visitors, Dullindal, and Rey entered the hangar. _Kevin Walker, _Shinn thought in disgust. _To think you dare to show your face on a ZAFT ship..._

Kevin glanced around the hangar, and nodded approvingly at what he saw. _ZAKUs, the Impulse, the Sturm Vogel... and a GuAIZ R? Odd to see something like that aboard a cutting-edge ship. Not much more than cannon fodder these days..._ "Impressive," he said aloud. "You've obviously been looking ahead, Chairman; I take it _Minerva_ was to be ready for action as soon as she was launched?"

"That was the idea, Baron," Dullindal acknowledged. "Fortunate, as it turned out."

Cagalli's gaze was more baleful, seeing all the weapons. "Are you enjoying this, Chairman?" she demanded. "You said that if you want peace, you have to be prepared to defend yourself from people who would break that peace. But both sides were working _toward_ peace; why would you even need to develop new weapons in the first place?"

Kevin winced; this was one matter they didn't agree on. _Could be worse, though,_ he consoled himself. _If she found out what you're doing at Artemis, she'd have your head on a platter, O Hydra. What _I've_ been doing makes Impulse look like an action figure..._

"Look, Cagalli," he said at last, "I think what happened today proved that the Chairman's fears _were_ well-founded; and remember, Orb did much the same thing, two years ago. We built mobile suits in order to defend ourselves from any potential enemy, even when both sides were ignoring us."

"Yes, but... that was different," she said stubbornly. "Whether we were involved in it at the time or not, there _was_ a war going on..."

"Excuses," another voice sneered. "The Athha family always was good at making excuses for their own actions!"

Cagalli stiffened; but her reaction was nothing compared to Kevin's. Outwardly, he appeared calm, but his head tracked to the side like a tank turret, turning to look at the speaker with chilling precision. "Do you have something to say, kid?" he asked quietly, pushing off toward Shinn. "Because if you _do_ have something more to say, Shinn Asuka, you might want to reconsider."

"I'm not afraid of you, Baron," Shinn said contemptuously, not flinching when the young noble landed on the deck less than two meters away. "You Orb nobles are all the same. It was the arrogance of the Athha family that led to Orb's downfall two years ago, and I see they haven't changed a bit."

Cagalli flinched, and Kevin's eyes froze. "No one talks about her like that," he said in a quiet, dangerous voice. "You can insult me all you want. You can insult _Orb_ all you want. But you keep a civil tongue in your head when talking about _her._ In fact, I suggest you not say another word, or I might do something drastic, like break your spine."

The pilot snorted. "You're all talk, 'Baron'. You wouldn't dare; not on a ZAFT ship. Not after you murdered your comrades five years ago-"

With blinding speed, Kevin's right arm shot forward, fingers wrapping around Shinn's neck, slamming him into the bulkhead with almost bone-shattered force. "Shut your mouth!" he snarled, oblivious to Lunamaria's gasp at Shinn's accusation. "You know _nothing_ about what happened five years ago! You have no _conception_ of the living hell that was ABADDON!"

"So you... do have some bite..." Shinn ground out through the merciless grip on his throat. "But... you're still a... Huh...?" He trailed off, realizing that the fingers gripping his neck felt _cold..._ like metal... No, they _were_ metal!

Kevin smiled humorlessly. "Yes, Shinn Asuka, that's right: this hand of mine isn't human. It's a masterwork of alloy and circuitry, an arm made from metal to replace the one made of flesh that was lost two years ago." Releasing the younger pilot's throat, he took a step backward, rubbing his right shoulder. "Now you see what happens when Man tries to play God... when you try to step beyond the bounds of what humans are meant to be. This arm is symbol of the pain you people have caused me... of the pain and suffering my genes have caused."

"Your genes...?" Lunamaria whispered, speaking for the first time.

The ex-ZAFT super-soldier jerked his head at Leona, who stood watching with an amused smile. "Look at her. She was part of it. I wasn't the only dirty little secret Patrick Zala had, you see. There's also people like her, hybrids of Coordinators and my kind, soldiers with the blood of the Hydra. In them the strength is diluted, a fraction of what the original is capable of, but still superior to an ordinary Coordinator."

"I don't understand," Lunamaria said, confused. "She was just part of the NGSF..."

Leona chuckled. "Let me tell you about the Next-Generation Special Forces," she said casually, ignoring Dullindal's wince. "We were ZAFT's last gasp at getting some use out of ABADDON. You see, there were _three _projects Patrick Zala authorized, not just one. First was ABADDON, which failed after six months thanks to the barbaric actions of Oracle, and then there was the Serpent Head program, which produced clones of Hydra to be used as the next best thing. They're almost all dead, however, thanks to a certain unauthorized clone; the only one of the group who survives is a very cunning individual, who has kept a low profile. But the third? Oh, yes, Miss Hawke, even the Next-Generation Special Forces were a relic of ABADDON. Using the few remaining samples of Kevin Walker's DNA, we all submitted to gene therapy, taking his genome unto our own. A less than pleasant experience, let me tell you; Coordinators were never meant to have their genome altered by that of _Homo Sapiens Modifica Extremis._ But we survived it, and we all bore many of Kevin Walker's unique traits. We are stronger, faster, tougher than any normal Coordinator. We are all, to a limited extent, empathic, just as the original is. We may not be augmented, but I assure you, Shinn Asuka, we are the next best thing. In short we, the NGSF, were the children of the Black Asp himself."

Shinn was undeterred. "You can talk all you want about the 'suffering' ZAFT caused," he sneered, "but it doesn't change what happened. _You_ killed your teammates, 'Baron'; _you_ were the one who murdered them!"

Kevin's response was, if anything, even less restrained than the last time. His right armed snapped up again, and a sixty-centimeter blade flickered into existence, bursting out of his sleeve and coming to a rest right against Shinn's throat. "Shut up," he whispered, fury evident in his cold jade eyes. "You don't know what happened there. You weren't there, and no records survive. Only _I_ know the truth." With his free hand, he reached around, gripped the right shoulder of his cloak, and tore it off, along with the right sleeve of his t-shirt.

Lunamaria's eyes went even wider at the sight. His entire right arm, from shoulder to fingertips and the blade extending from his wrist, was gleaming metal, resembling the gauntlet of a suit of armor. And his left arm... It was covered in scars, from his hand all the way up, disappearing into his shirt. The same was true of his neck... and every mark looked like the result of something terrible.

Even Shinn was speechless, though the blade at his throat might've had something to do with it. "Let me tell you the _truth_ of ABADDON," Kevin whispered. "Of how I was kidnapped only days after my parents died, of how I was tortured for weeks on end while Jeffrey 'Oracle' Harris and his twisted scientists tried to break me. Of how, in the end, my memory was wiped, and chemicals were applied to brainwash me. Oh, I was a loyal soldier, alright, but only because they'd broken me, molded me into what _they_ wanted... and the bastards didn't even think to check my genome for signs of zoanthrope genes." He smiled thinly, without the slightest trace of humor. "Chemical brainwashing doesn't work on us, you see. Not for very long. And when it wore off, when the full import of what had been done to me registered, my mind snapped. Yes, it was I who killed them. It was my fangs and claws that massacred my friends. But it was Oracle who broke me, ZAFT who destroyed my mind. And I have to live with that every day of my life." His jade gaze bored into Shinn's crimson eyes, and there was no trace of compassion there. "I know all about your sad past, Shinn Asuka; I remember the records from those days. But don't think for an _instant _that what you went through is anywhere near as bad as _my_ life. Try to remember that, punk."

Cagalli finally decided things had gone far enough. "Stand down, Kevin," she ordered, inwardly as shocked as any of them... especially by the disturbing implications of that arm. _That blade wasn't there on the original model... and that looked like nanotechnology..._

Kevin simply nodded in response to her command. "As ordered." The blade vanished as abruptly as it had appeared, and he turned away... to see Lunamaria staring at him.

"You... you killed her," she whispered. "Erica died... by _your_ hand... She trusted you..."

"This isn't exactly how I planned to tell you," he said quietly. "But yes... it was my hand that did the deed. I don't expect you to believe me, but... I'm sorry. Sorrier than you can ever know..." He pushed off from the deck, heading for a hatch.

Athrun watched him go, and swallowed hard. _I am _so_ glad I didn't tick him off that badly in the war,_ he thought soberly. _It's so easy to forget there's a killer in there..._

"I apologize for what Shinn said," Rey said to Cagalli, giving the other -and apparently unrepentant- pilot a sharp glance. "He had no right to say those things. I'll deal with him later, I promise." His eyes indicated Lunamaria, who was looking more than a little stunned. "I'd warn the Baron to steer clear of her for awhile, if I were you; that could've been handled better."

Cagalli nodded. "Agreed." That was the first time in years she'd heard Kevin rip into someone like that over ABADDON, and she had the unpleasant feeling it might've gotten bloody if she hadn't ordered him off. There weren't many words that could provoke Kevin to violence, but bringing up the ABADDON program at all was a risky proposition.

Dullindal touched Kevin's human arm on his way by. "I'd rather you not make a habit of nearing killing our pilots," he said quietly, "but I can understand why you did it. You have my apologies, Baron, for everything that was done to you."

"I don't need your sympathy," Kevin told him, eyes chilly but not as cold as before. "It's a little late for apologies. All I can do now is try to honor my fallen comrades, and try to move on. But understand this, Chairman: the past is _not_ dead."

Almost as though to emphasize his point, alarms started blaring. _"Battle stations!"_ the intercom announced. _"All hands to battlestations! This is not a drill!"_

Dullindal closed his eyes. "So much for our respite. The four of you, please, come with me. I have a feeling you should see this." He glanced sidelong at Kevin. "And I suspect your input could be valuable, Baron. Few people alive have combat experience as extensive as yours. I know, you still aren't fond of ZAFT, but I would suggest that this is in your own self-interest."

The Baron nodded. "I'm not an idiot, Chairman, and I _am_ a pragmatist. Let's go."

* * *

"We've spotted Bogey One, Ma'am!" Meyrin called. "Directly ahead, distance five hundred. They're approaching an asteroid." 

"Probably searching for cover," Gladys mused. "Sound battlestations, and prepare for battle. All pilots to mobile suits; arm Tristans and load Neidhardt missiles."

The alarms began to ring out throughout the ship, and activity went from normal duty to something resembling a beehive; down in the hangar, a certain black-haired mechanic heard the announcement, and hurriedly went back to work on the Sturm Vogel, while on the ship's outer hull, weapons rose into firing position.

"Any sign they've noticed us yet?" the captain asked.

"Readings consistent with armed beam weapons," Meyrin answered. "They're also deploying Dagger L mobile suits, and moving closer to the asteroid... They're firing a grappler of some kind, Captain. Putting it on screen."

On the monitor, Bogey One could be seen firing what appeared to be a ship-sized rocket anchor into the asteroid, using it essentially as a piton gun to pull herself into a cavity, presumably for cover. From that position, _Minerva_ couldn't hit the mysterious vessel without first blasting through several layers of rock... which would result in chunks of asteroid flying at them. Possibly _large_ chunks.

The Bridge hatch slid open, admitting Dullindal, Cagalli, and her bodyguards. "Sorry to intrude," the Chairman said as they entered, "but I felt that Representative Athha should observe, as a combat veteran. Also, Baron Onishi's input might be valuable, under the circumstances."

Gladys nodded absently. "Very well." She punched buttons on her armrest. "Pilots, launch immediately."

_"Lunamaria Hawke, Gunner ZAKU Warrior, launching!"_ Though still deeply disturbed by Kevin's revelations, she refused to allow it to effect her performance in this battle.

_"Shinn Asuka, launching!"_

Kevin watched the launch of the Impulse with great interest. He'd hard of this particular machine's capabilities, and was interested in seeing just how it came together. _So, the legs, torso, and cockpit all launch separately,_ he thought, _as well as the weapons. It reminds me of the Strike... versatile, certainly -being able to replace large portions of the machine must mid-battle must be handy- but there are weaknesses inherent in that. Jack of all trades is master of none, and something designed to separate into that many pieces must have structural integrity issues._ He smiled to himself. _What a pity the Nemesis is still on Earth; _that_ would certainly give those Earth Forces dogs pause._

As he watched, Impulse pulled itself together, using a laser-guidance system, and Dullindal nodded to himself. "Once more unto the breach, hm, Baron?" he remarked.

"Yes," Kevin agreed. "The game's afoot. Fell deeds await..."

Beside him, Cagalli couldn't help thinking about the first thing Shinn had shouted at them, in the hangar._Excuses...? Is that really... all it is? Maybe... Kevin's right. Will war really continue as long as there are people? And if that's true, then _do_ we always need this kind of strength?_

"Don't second-guess yourself now, Cagalli," Kevin murmured, gripping her shoulder. "Shinn Asuka, from what I've seen, is little more than our old friend Yzak's vices with none of his virtues; I wouldn't put much stock in what he says."

She smiled gratefully. "Thanks, Kevin..."

"I wonder what that ship's real name is?" Dullindal wondered aloud, sounding pensive.

Leona glanced at him. "Does it matter? When I was in the NGSF, I rarely cared anything about the name of an enemy ship, you know. The important thing was to reduce it to space dust."

He smiled faintly. "Ph, I would say a name is important, Miss Colde. A name is what defines something, and if the name is false... well, then, does that make the thing which it defines false, as well? That's an interesting question, wouldn't you say, Alex Dino?" he said nodding at Athrun, before correcting himself with that same smile. "Or should I say... Athrun Zala?"

Heads turned on the Bridge, for they all knew the name Zala. A very prominent name, in the war, and before that, when the PLANTs first began to move toward independence. First known as a patriot... and then as a madman, for attempting to use the weapon of mass destruction known as GENESIS on Earth.

Athrun Zala, soldier of ZAFT... son of Patrick Zala, one of the two most notorious figures of the Earth/ZAFT War.

* * *

Author's note: Frank Castile has been murdered, Kevin Onishi is exposed as Kevin Walker, and tensions mount aboard _Minerva_ as secrets are revealed and the battle begins. Why did Castile die... and what role will the Hydra play in the coming conflict? 

Okay, I know, it's been a couple of months since the last time this was updated, and around two weeks since I last posted anything. Well, I'm back, and barring heat stroke, the next update should come a little faster. At any rate, I expect this chapter was rather interesting, given all the things going on; and I think you can safely assume there will be a lot of these twists happening in this story. It _is_ a Brothers in Arms story, after all, and I can't write one of them without the odd mystery or three thrown in.

Anyway, let me know what you thought of it. -Solid Shark


	4. Chapter 4: Waking Tiger

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, and Frank Castile

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"It says something about the world when a man is created for no other purpose than to fight. I was engineered to be the 'Perfect Soldier', and though it took almost fourteen years, that's what I became. With cybernetic augmentation added to the genetics my 'father' gave me, I became perhaps the most lethal man to ever live... yet not necessarily the most lethal _human. 

_"There's one person even I'm not sure I could ever have defeated, and if I were to ever meet Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, codename Delta, on the field of battle, I would be wary indeed. I have been known as the 'Legendary Soldier', but in her day _she_ was known as the 'Legendary Mercenary'. A woman with experience on a hundred battlefields, she only retired from the mercenary trade when she emigrated to the PLANTs, and swore fealty to ZAFT. It was from her that my comrades and I drew our combat skills, yet she was even better. The Destroyer archetype, she was the first to train in this trade as an augmented soldier, and she perfected it._

_"I was the one born a soldier, but she lived it longer than I've been alive. Had ZAFT been able to deploy Delta during the war, even I might've been swiped aside like an insect..."_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_The Mendel colony. Abandoned months before as a result of a biohazard threat, it made a perfect place for two fugitive super-soldiers to recuperate following the massacre at the laboratory. By the standards of normal humans, the colony was still uninhabitable, but to Mike and his wounded companion, the threat was minimal._

_Unfortunately, their cautious exploration of the ghostly place revealed things that might have preferred not to know. "There's no doubt about it," Mike said grimly, standing over a container he'd found their second day at the colony. "This cannister originally contained SM-Six; a nasty bug Tom told me about that Medical Section was working on."_

_His companion felt ill. "But how did an ABADDON weapon end up _here,_ Mike? This was supposed to have been Blue Cosmos' work, wasn't it?"_

_"Yeah, that's what we were told..." Mike stared intently at the cannister, and increased magnification on his vision. "I'm seeing fibers from Destroyer commando fatigues, though, and traces from unpowered armor... Maybe I can get a genetic read on it."_

_"No need," the other soldier whispered. "I know who did this." The soldier glanced at Mike. "This was Kevin's handiwork, I'm sure of it."_

_"Kevin? But- Oh, yeah," Mike murmured, thinking back. "He _did_ go missing for a few days around then, didn't he? He must've been sent out on a 'training exercise'... and Oracle wanted war so bad he just might've made a deal with Blue Cosmos." He shuddered. "My friend, I think we should be glad Kevin made sure we could never be deployed. The thought of what Oracle might've made us do... I'm beginning to think we weren't on the side of the angels after all..."_

* * *

"How much longer are you planning to keep me locked up here, anyway?" a red-haired girl with blue eyes asked of her captor. "It's been almost two years..." 

A youth with sandy hair and jade eyes sighed, leaning against the wall. "It could be worse," Jack Carter said tiredly. "Better a luxury apartment, even one with armed guards, than a coffin. In case you've forgotten, Blue Cosmos was intending to kill you the minute you opened your mouth in Atlantic Federation territory; your name still carries too much influence for them to risk it."

"So you kidnapped me and locked me up in an abandoned space colony for my own protection," Flay Allster said sarcastically. "Sorry if I have a hard time believing that. Kevin told me a lot about you, Carter, and none of it good."

The two of them were in a well-furbished apartment in Carter's orbital base, hidden away from prying eyes; most of the base was devoted to Carter's own vendetta, but one section had been remodeled into an apartment after he'd stumbled across a plot that he didn't approve of.

Now Carter closed his eyes, reminding himself that the girl had good reason to be skeptical of him. "I admit your old Captain has good reason for not liking me," he said carefully. "I don't like him either; it's why I've tried to kill him a time or two. But I learned my lesson two years ago, Miss Allster: going after his friends is a good way to end up dead. Walker himself is my _only_ target -aside from Blue Cosmos- so you can relax a little, okay? I really don't mean you any harm... and if I did, I've had plenty of time to do something about it."

Turning away with a huff, Flay nonetheless had to admit Kevin Onishi's clone had a point. After she'd left_ Dominion_'s crew a few months after the war, she'd been intending to return to the Atlantic Federation, in hopes of changing them from within using her family name's influence. Before she could do so, however, her shuttle had been boarded by agents of one Jack Carter, and she'd been taken to his hidden base... for her own protection, according to Carter. She wasn't sure she could believe that, but she _did_ concede she'd been treated well. Her quarters here were more comfortable than those she'd had aboard _Dominion,_ and aside from the hangar and what she presumed was a genetics lab, she had the run of the base.

Flay finally turned back to the clone, who wore an outfit virtually identical to that which Kevin had worn during the war, save only for his choice of weaponry (he carried a Heckler and Koch Mark 23 forty-five caliber auto pistol, instead of a revolver). "But that doesn't explain why you can't at least let me out into the colonies. I understand I have to avoid the Earth Alliance, but..."

Carter smiled wryly. "You know, I've been wondering when you'd ask that question. The answer's simple enough: according to my sources, Blue Cosmos has just a few too many spies up in orbit. The only places that I know are safe are this base and wherever Walker's set up shop. And quite frankly, I think it's better to make sure_ nobody_ knows where you are. Walker's good at keeping secrets, I'll give him that, but the more people know, the more likely it is to leak."

"Hmph." That was one thing about Carter that _really_ annoyed Flay: it was just as difficult to win an argument with him as with the original. "Still... how much longer?"

Carter shrugged. "I don't know... but I've been hearing rumors that things are about to heat up again between Earth and the PLANTs. If that happens, Blue Cosmos will probably have more urgent things to worry about than you."

Surprised, Flay glanced up, but before she could respond, the apartment door slid open, and a tense-looking Jonathan Sarnac stepped in. "Sorry to intrude, Sir," he said briskly, "but we have a situation. We just received word that Armory One was attacked, probably by the Earth Forces."

Carter looked at him sharply. "Armory One? That's where ZAFT was building their new ship and prototype mobile suits."

His exec nodded. "Yes, Sir. According to our source, three of the prototypes were stolen, before being driven off by a fourth prototype and the _Minerva._ Also..." He hesitated. "It seems ZAFT's sole Sturm Vogel was also involved, being piloted by Baron Onishi."

The clone stiffened. "He was _there?_ Oh, of course; that diplomatic visit we heard about." He frowned, thinking. "If the Earth Forces are acting this brazenly, then this cold war is about to get hot again... and that could have unpleasant consequences." Carter sighed. "Sometimes I wish I _was_ the sociopath Walker accuses me of being; then I could just ignore it. Well, no help for it." He nodded to his exec. "Jonathan, get Justice loaded onto the_ D'Artangan; _we're moving out."

* * *

The blue-haired "bodyguard" could feel the stares from the men and women on the Bridge, the stares that came in response to Dullindal's words. _So,_ he thought, almost sadly, _my cover is blown. Now what? I guess... there's no more point in hiding it._

He looked over at Gladys, and met her eyes levelly. "That's right," he said flatly. "My name... is Athrun Zala, I am the son of Patrick Zala."

Athrun could almost feel the urge of several of those present had to reach for weapons, but he was not in the least afraid... because he knew who he had on his side. The distinctive sound of air displaced by a twirling object was followed swiftly by the sound of a cocking hammer, as Kevin's left hand brought a revolver up at arm's length.

"Wouldn't make any rash moves, if I were you," Kevin said pleasantly. "I don't want to use this -black powder in the air system probably wouldn't be good- but if anyone tries to hurt my friend, they're dog meat."

"Agreed," Leona said casually, as her hand emerged from her jacket. Her arm relaxed at her side, but the enormous Desert Eagle made its point anyway.

Dullindal raised a hand. "Be at ease, Baron, Miss Colde. I don't intend to harm you, Athrun Zala," he went on, turning to the former ZAFT soldier. "I just wanted to talk to you, without your false persona getting the way. Former Chairman Eileen Canaver explained your actions and your reasons for them to me, so I believe I understand why you acted as you did."

"I very much doubt you have the whole story, Chairman," Athrun said quietly. "Though I appreciate what you're saying, Sir."

The Chairman raised an eyebrow. "Please, enlighten me, Athrun. What part of the story am I missing?"

Cagalli noticed the sudden guarded look that appeared on Kevin's face, and grasped what it was that Athrun was talking about. "You mean Jachin Due," she murmured, and turned to Dullindal. "He means that no one knows what happened in Jachin's final moments except those who were there. Only they know how Chairman Zala died."

Athrun nodded, carefully controlling his expression and his emotions. "That's right."

Gladys frowned. "I didn't know there was any question about it. The official record states he died when Jachin self-destructed."

"The official record is a complete fabrication," Kevin said softly, tucking his revolver back into its concealed holster. "Zala was dead some minutes before that. The three of us had infiltrated the fortress in hopes of stopping GENESIS that way, but we were too late... and Zala had a crime to pay for anyway." His eerie, glowing jade eyes were focused on something not visible to anyone else. "I was carrying a plasma rifle, in case of any opponents my own caliber... and a single bolt from that very weapon incinerated that bastard."

The Captain's eyes widened, Meyrin uttered a gasp, Trine simply looked like he'd been hit in the head with an axe, and even Dullindal blinked. "I wasn't aware you'd done that personally, Baron," he said finally. "Though I shouldn't be surprised, given your... reputation."

"He had it coming," Kevin said flatly. "He authorized the kidnapping; in the end, he and Muruta Azrael were the ones who began my troubles. Azrael had my parents murdered, and Zala forced me into the project that made me what I am." He ignored the reactions from those who only then realized what he meant, and simply shrugged. "Though my motivation was, quite frankly, revenge, it was also a legitimate act of war. In any case, I believe we have more important matters to attend to."

The Chairman nodded. "Quite right, Baron. The events from two years ago don't have much bearing on the battle before us."

"I'd call that more important," Leona said laconically, glancing out the forward viewport. "As you said, Kevin, the game's afoot."

Impulse -equipped with the Blast pack this time- and Luna's ZAKU were getting close to the target area now, and they began to slow. _"I don't like this,"_ Luna said over the radio, voice tense. _"I didn't score well in the asteroid simulations; getting into a situation like this for real..."_

_"Be careful, then, Luna,"_ Shinn warned her. _"We can't afford any mistakes out here. The stakes are too high."_

Athrun frowned, watching them approach the asteroid and the Dagger Ls Bogey One had deployed. "I don't like this," he murmured, echoing Luna's words unconsciously. "Something about this doesn't seem right, somehow..."

"I know," Gladys concurred. "Something's _not_ right here."

Kevin's eyes narrowed, and he carefully observed both the viewport and the monitors. _They're right; something about this smells bad. It's been two years, but I still know an ambush when I see one... if only I could get a closer look!_

He was still watching when something else changed, much closer, and it took all his formidable control not to visibly react when something clicked in his head. _Remote activation? How's that possible? Who..._

_"This is what the world has been brought to,"_ a voice, feminine-sounding but distorted such that he couldn't recognize it, murmured from the radio embedded in Kevin's left mastoid process. _"Both sides strove for power, and when one tipped the balance, the other struck; now the actions of both lead only to one point, my friend. Like matter and antimatter, Natural and Coordinator rush toward each other, and in their collision both will be annihilated. T.S. Elliot was wrong: the world ends not with a whimper, but with a bang..."_

Kevin started to reply to the whisperer, but he was distracted by the view on the screen. "I knew it," he said, almost to himself. "A trap..."

Outside, Chaos, Gaia, and Abyss exploded out of hiding, firing at _Minerva_'s machines as they came. The pilot of Chaos in particular was demonstrating an unpleasant aptitude for his machine's remote weapons pods, sending them out ahead of him to engage the ZAFT units.

Shinn and Luna both broke away to either side, escaping the initial, deadly barrage, but a latecomer to the battle, the sole GuAIZ R Kevin had noticed earlier, was unable to evade. The obsolete machine was caught in the laser and missile fire before it could hope to evade, and it was tore apart in seconds, missiles blasting its limbs off in explosions of shrapnel, lasers melting and shattering through torso armor...

The owner of the mysterious voice was evidently watching the battle somehow; either via Kevin's own nervous system, through the old Destroyer linkages, or perhaps directly, form some hidden location among the debris that surrounded them. Either way, her next words showed she -whoever "she" was- was paying attention. _"And here it begins, O Black Asp, O Hydra. Another life lost in this endless battle. What will be your choice, my Commander? Will you sit by and watch, or will you stand and fight? The lives of billions, the Fate of the entire world, hinges upon your decision..."_

The radio implant shut down again, and Kevin was left alone with his own thoughts. _Mu once told Kira that if he had the power to make a difference, he should put it to good use... I swore long ago to protect Cagalli, no matter what the cost. Whoever it was that just spoke to me, whether she was right about the world or not, she was right about one thing. I have to make a choice... and I've made it._

He turned to Gladys. "You have to let me go out there," he said quietly.

Cagalli looked at him in surprise. "Kevin? What are you talking about? You can't-"

"She's right, Baron," Gladys told him. "This isn't your fight, and besides, we've nothing for you to fly. Leave the fighting to the professionals."

Kevin's eyes flashed. "In case you've forgotten, Captain, I _am_ the professional. There's not a man or woman on this ship with more combat experience than I, and it most certainly _is_ my fight. Beyond self-preservation, beyond my duties as a bodyguard, I swore once to Lord Uzumi Nara Athha -and before that, to myself- that I'd protect Cagalli with my very life. And I _do_ have something to fly out there: the Chairman himself told me you don't have any pilots that can fly the Sturm Vogel. Well, I flew the machine it's based on during the war, and while I may not be in top form right now, I assure you I can handle it."

"But you don't even have a flightsuit, Kevin," Cagalli protested. "If your cockpit is hit..."

"I'm willing to take that chance," he said quietly. "I swore to protect you, and that's what I'm going to do. Captain," he went on, looking again at Gladys, "I realize that this is a ZAFT ship, and I'm an Orb national. But you_ know_ what I'm capable of, and none of your pilots have the combat piloting experience I do. I survived Jachin -mostly- and I can survive this."

"It's probably a good idea," Dullindal put in smoothly. "As the Baron says, we don't have anyone that can pilot the Sturm Vogel, and we need every machine, under the circumstances. Why not let him do it? With the Chief Representative aboard, this _is_ his fight."

Gladys closed her eyes. "Very well," she said at last. "Be careful, Baron, but -assuming it's been fully repaired- you may take your chances with that machine. Good luck."

Kevin nodded. "Thank you."

Cagalli swallowed. "Be careful out there, Kevin," she whispered. "Don't die on me again..."

"I won't," he promised. "I refuse to die here." Then he turned, and made his way off the Bridge, toward the hangar.

As the Baron left, Meyrin stiffened. "Captain, Bogey One is no longer appearing on radar! They've just vanished into-"

"Mirage Colloid," Leona said grimly. "Must be. We pulled stunts like that in the NGSF, after ZAFT reverse-engineered the technology. Be on your guard, they won't stay in hiding for long."

A blast of emerald energy flashed past the viewports, streaking out ahead of _Minerva,_ and Meyrin stiffened again. "They're behind us, Captain," she announced, "and two Dagger Ls are coming directly ahead."

Gladys cursed inwardly, mind running over the tactical situation. _The debris is blocking most evasive courses; we can't get out of this just by turning. We'll have to try something different..._ "Put us on course to circle that asteroid," she ordered. "Get us close, and bring us around. Hangar," she added, activating the intercom, "what's the status of the Sturm Vogel?"

_"Repairs are done, Captain,"_ Alec responded. _"Had to make some parts from scratch, but we got it done in record time. Why?"_

"Because Baron Onishi is on his way down to you, Mister Alexander," Gladys told him. "He'll be taking it out; and see what you can do about a flightsuit for him."

_"Roger that."_

"Meyrin," she continued, "signal Shinn and Lunamaria; let them know we're under attack."

"Yes, Captain!"

The Bridge went into a flurry of quiet activity, and Leona nodded to herself. _Been awhile since I was in a battle like this, but I see ZAFT procedures haven't changed much. What I want to know, though... is what made Kevin decide so suddenly to intervene. Spur of the moment, or did something else get his attention? And if something did... what was it?_

She had the distinct feeling that there was something else going on that wasn't obvious to the world at large...

* * *

Arriving down in the hangar, Kevin found Vino, Yolant, and Alec waiting for him at the foot of the machine that so resembled his old unit. Two of the mechanics wore bemused expressions; the third was almost unreadable, and held a standard-issue ZAFT flightsuit. 

"You're really taking it out, Baron?" Vino wondered aloud. "You sure about that?"

"Yeah," Yolant agreed. "We've never had a pilot who can even fly the thing... at least, that's what I've heard. They don't tell us mechanics much."

"I can handle it," Kevin said simply, looking up at the mobile suit. "Pretty fast repair job there, given the damage she took at Armory One."

"You can get a lot of things done when you're expecting to die at any minute," Alec said quietly. "Come on, I'll help you get prepped."

His former commander nodded, and the pair of ex-ABADDON soldiers pushed off toward the Sturm Vogel's cockpit, away from the two oblivious mechanics. "I'm surprised you're doing this," Kevin said softly, once they were far enough away. "I thought you wanted me dead."

"I wouldn't mind it," Alec admitted. "But right now, you're more good alive than dead. If you can help protect this ship, then I'm all in favor of it." He held out the flightsuit. "Take it; I checked your dimensions earlier, so I was able to find a pretty close fit. This way, you won't instantly die if your cockpit is breached."

"Thanks," the sandy-haired youth said sincerely. "I'll do my best out there."

"You always do," Alec told him, with a faint trace of a smile. "Just watch out for Shinn; he's a bit of a hothead, and I don't think he likes you very much."

Kevin snorted. "Shinn Asuka doesn't worry me; that little punk has so little control I can feel his intention to fire even without being empathic. Lunamaria Hawke is the one I'm _really_ worried about. What with Asuka's inconvenient revelation, her mental state is so confused -at least where I'm concerned- that my first warning that she's intending to shoot will be the energy blast that vaporizes me."

His former subordinate shook his head. "I don't think you need to worry about that. She's still too confused right now; it'll be a while before she outright decides to shoot you, I think."

"How reassuring." The Baron muttered a Russian imprecation under his breath, and then climbed into the cockpit. "I'll see you later, Alec... assuming I don't die."

The hatch closed, and Alec pushed himself away. _You, die? Not likely, old comrade. You've walked into at least two nuclear explosions and come out of it alive; I'm thinking a mere Earth Forces mobile suit attack won't be enough to bring _you_ down..._

* * *

Shinn threw Impulse to one side, and snapped off a red-orange blast from his right-hand cannon just as an emerald beam from one of Chaos' gunbarrels scorched past him. "Bastard," he muttered. "Don't they ever give up? This is ridiculous!" 

"I know," Luna agreed, feeding power to her thrusters, before sending a burst of fire from her own beam cannon at the Abyss. "They've already learned how to use them..."

_"Shinn, Luna,"_ Meyrin called, _"return to the ship at once; we're under attack by Dagger Ls and Bogey One!"_

Shinn cursed. "They got behind us... We're on our way. Do we have any support coming?"

_"Affirmative. Baron Onishi is launching in the Sturm Vogel to provide support; he'll be joining you soon."_

His crimson eyes narrowed. "I don't need any help from him," he said quietly, wrenching Impulse around to face the way they'd come. "What is he doing, anyway? It's not like an Orb noble to charge out into battle like that; they're cowards..."

"Not him, Shinn," Luna said softly, following him. "I don't know what happened that last day, but I know Kevin Walker's no coward. He fought during the war, remember?"

"Maybe... but I still don't trust him." _What kind of game is that bastard playing?_ Shinn wondered. _He killed so many ZAFT soldiers during the last war, abandoned Orb and fled like a coward when the Earth Forces attacked, betrayed and murdered his comrades in ABADDON... what is he trying to pull, _helping_ us?_

Ahead of them, a black shape came into view, four-legged, with a BuCUE-like head... and a pair of beam cannons on the shoulders. It was running along a wrecked space colony's outer surface...

"Watch it, Luna," Shinn snapped. "It's the Gaia!"

Impulse and the ZAKU scattered to either side, allowing the twin bolts of emerald fire from Gaia to pass harmlessly between them. Another pair following, scorching a furrow along the right leg of Luna's machine, and then Gaia sprang off the colony, transforming back into mobile suit mode.

"You're good," Stellar murmured coldly. "But it won't save you from me." She lifted her rifle, and triggered a quick pair of shots at Luna, while Abyss and Chaos swooped in to hound Shinn.

Luna managed to duck beneath the twin blasts, and retaliated with her own emerald bolt. "This doesn't look good," she muttered, watching Gaia nimbly dodge to the side, then convert to mobile armor mode and cling to another piece of debris. "Those new machines..."

A pair of emerald streaks slashed across space side by side, forcing Stellar to leap away again. "What was-"

"Back off," Kevin commanded, dashing across space to Luna's side. "I may be out of practice, but I can still deal with _you."_ He was using a frequency he recalled from _Archangel_'s time with the Earth Forces, which Frank Castile's sources had indicated was still in use.

Apparently, they were right. "Who are you?" Stellar demanded. "You aren't ZAFT..."

"No, I'm not," Kevin agreed, leveling the Sturm Vogel's pair of beam rifles. "It doesn't really matter who I am, though; name means nothing on the battlefield. I fought you people in the war, and survived. I can still do the same thing today."

"What are you doing out here, Baron?" Luna wondered, struggling with her own emotions. "After everything that's happened-"

"I have a duty to Cagalli," he answered quietly. "And while I can never make up for what I did to ABADDON, I can at least help keep Erica's sisters alive." His fingers tightened carefully on the triggers; very carefully, in the case of his cybernetic hand (he vividly remembered destroying his own cherished sidearm with that hand, during the war). "Let's dance!"

A little ways off, Shinn sneered to himself, even as he spiraled around a blast from Auel's multiphase energy cannon and a barrage from Sting's gunbarrels. _So the Baron's come to 'rescue' us, huh?_ he thought, darting toward the wreckage of an old space colony. _As if we need his help. He's a useless, over-bred, out of practice__ bastard who doesn't know how to mind his own business..._ He turned, snapped off a pair of red-orange bolts from his cannons, and then vanished into the dark confines of the wreckage.

Abyss and Chaos braked to a halt just outside. "He's got nowhere to go in there," Sting remarked. "Like a rat in a maze."

"We'll catch him on his way out," Auel agreed. "Then we can finish that interloper and the ship at our leisure."

* * *

"There's that machine again," Neo murmured, watching the Sturm Vogel come to the ZAKU's rescue. "This could complicate things... Is he transmitting?" 

"Affirmative, Captain," his communications officer answered. "It's an older frequency, but still in use."

"Put it on."

A moment later, the interloper pilot's voice came over the speakers. _"No, I'm not. It doesn't really matter who I am, though; name means nothing on the battlefield. I fought you people in the war, and survived. I can still do the same thing today."_

Neo stiffened, frowning behind his mask. "That voice... I _know_ I've heard that voice somewhere before..."

Lee glanced at him, puzzled. "Sir? Is something wrong?"

"I don't know, Ian," the masked captain said honestly. "But something about this doesn't feel right. I've heard that voice somewhere, seen that flying style..." He came a decision, and his feet. "Prepare to launch missiles against the asteroids around _Minerva;_ we'll try to batter them to death with debris. Meanwhile, I'm going out there myself."

That confused his exec even more. "Sir? But... why?"

"Because there are some things you can only be sure of when exchanging fire with one another," Neo answered, and left.

Lee watched him go, and wondered just what it was about the interloper pilot that had his captain so intent.

* * *

Kevin spun the Sturm Vogel around, snapped off a shot with one of the beam rifles, and then latched the left-hand rifle to a hardpoint on the machine's hip. "You're really starting to bug me," he informed Stellar, and yanked out a beam saber. "Try this instead!" 

Stellar responded by sending a pair of bolts scorching at Luna's ZAKU, before leaping forward with her back-mounted beam sabers active. "You won't stop us," she told him, rushing for him. "You're not that good."

He parried hastily with his fiery blade, and conceded with a wince she might have a point. _You're out of practice, Kevin,_ he sniped at himself. _Two years ago, you would've torn her apart; only Rau Le Creuset ever defeated Sturm Falke. Of course, that _was_ Stormhawk, and this is just an imitation, and back then, your augmentation was fully online..._

Gaia shot past him, reverted to mobile suit mode, and drew a conventional saber, igniting a blade of frozen fire in its hand. "Pathetic," Stellar murmured, slashing at the Sturm Vogel.

Kevin tried to parry, but was too slow, and managed only to force the opposing blade to one side of its intended target. It missed his cockpit, but melted a terrible furrow in the left side of his torso. "You'll pay for that, you unexpurgated deletion..." He fired off a shot, missed, and then closed his eyes. _You can do this,_ he told himself. _Concentrate, wait for it, and..._

Gaia unleashed a vicious backhand, but this time Kevin stopped it without even looking, his blade snapping up and holding hers away no more than a meter from the Sturm Vogel's cockpit.

Stellar paused, surprised. "How did you-"

"You shouldn't have taken liberties with me," Kevin hissed, and bodily forced Gaia away from him. "Even the Earth Forces should remember me... Kevin Walker." He boosted backwards, put away the saber, and pulled out the other beam rifle again. "Beware the Crimson Tiger!"

* * *

On _Minerva_'s Bridge, Cagalli winced, hearing that transmission. "Now he's done it; they'll be all over him..." 

"He'll be fine," Leona reassured her. "He may be rusty, but it's coming back to him fast. But, ah... how _did_ he do that? I'm pretty sure he was flying with his eyes closed for a few seconds there..."

Athrun's eyes were fixed on the screen. "Kevin's empathic abilities are more developed than yours," he said quietly. "I've never seen him pull that particular trick before, but I think he was monitoring Gaia's position by sensing its pilot; not as exact as some methods, but it also had the benefit of allowing him to tell when the enemy pilot intended to strike. I guess he's been practicing..."

"Theoretically," Dullindal put in, "he could've done even better. As I understand it, had his augmentation been online his own sensors would've allowed him to track the location of Gaia's beam saber. Combine that with the abilities you refer to, and he'd be a formidable opponent indeed." _One which I think I may take care not to have fighting against me,_ he thought to himself. _Either he must be convinced to join me, or he must be kept out of things entirely..._

Gladys ignored the byplay; she was intent on the battle itself, and she winced at what she saw. Impulse came slashing out of its hiding place, unleashing high-energy death from its cannons, and both Chaos and Abyss were forced to dodge away; but Chaos's gunbarrels gamely swooped in, spitting fire at Shinn.

* * *

Gaia and the Sturm Vogel flashed past next, tailed at a careful distance by Luna's ZAKU; Kevin and the stolen machine were exchanging almost constant energy fire. The Sturm Vogel had the upper hand in some respects, with two emerald bolts scorching across space for every one of Gaia's, but that very rate of fire also increased the drain on the machine's battery... 

And _Minerva_ herself was caught in one place, under attack by Dagger Ls, and unable to use most of her weaponry because of the surrounding debris. This close, and the energy weapons stood a good chance of hurting _them_ with the backblast. _Which just leaves the missiles,_ Gladys thought grimly. _And, perhaps, the skill of a man who used to be ZAFT's most bitter enemy..._

"Prepare to fire Neidhardt missiles," she ordered at last. "Try to get those Daggers off us."

"Yes, Ma'am," Trine concurred; and then Athrun stiffened.

_Something's wrong here,_ he thought, watching the incoming missiles. _This reminds me of a trick Natarle pulled on the _Archangel_ once... except they're not heading to ambush us. They're going to hit, all right, but not the ship; they're aimed at..._ "Captain, those missiles are going to hit the surrounding asteroids! We should get out of here."

Gladys glared at the screen; she understood exactly what he meant. "Detail some of our missiles to destroying incoming debris, and try to get us moving out of here," she commanded, and glanced back at Cagalli. "Will Baron Onishi hold his ground, Lady Cagalli?"

Cagalli nodded firmly. "He won't let us down, Captain. He never does. No matter his problems with ZAFT, he'll come through."

"Yeah," Athrun agreed. "Even more than for himself, he'll fight to protect the Chief Representative. No one threatens her and gets away with it."

Leona silently concurred. She'd known quite a few soldiers in her time, and Kevin was, as far as she could tell, utterly fearless. Presumably there was _something_ he feared -no sane man had _no_ fears- but if so, she had yet to see it. The man had been killed on four separate occasions -irradiated, crushed, shot, and the first time completely incinerated- and he _still_ walked into battle, with absolutely no fear of death... and even without his cybernetics, he was a fearsome foe. She hadn't been there, the day Blue Cosmos killed Mu La Flaga, but she'd visited the site before the bodies were removed, and had been quite impressed.

It wasn't deliberate brutality; Kevin didn't work that way, save for -according to rumors- his time on the run, years before. It was, however, brutally _efficient._ A dozen armed terrorists against a single teenage nobleman with a rapier, and he'd gotten them all. One severed head, one shredded heart, and a truly impressive collection of broken bones and traumatized bodies. Through it all, the terrorists had fired a single shot -the one that grazed Mu and caused him to stumble off the cliff- and nicked Kevin very slightly with a combat knife.

Kevin and Murrue had survived. Mu had not, and that had been the downfall of the Blue Cosmos hit team. That lesson, combined with the one which had cost Muruta Azrael his life, had apparently been taken to heart by Blue Cosmos and the Earth Alliance: attack Kevin Walker, and he will kill you. An acceptable risk, perhaps. But attack his loved ones, and he will kill you, your friends, and anyone else remotely connected to you.

No. Kevin would not flee, even if it cost him his life. _One of his more endearing traits,_ Leona thought in mild amusement.

* * *

Kevin himself had found himself back to back with Shinn, as Impulse fended off Abyss and Chaos while Kevin exchanged fire with Gaia, with Luna providing what support she could with her powerful cannon. "This is _not_ how I was hoping to spend this trip," he grunted, snapping off an emerald bolt in time to cancel one from Stellar. "I'm getting just a little fed up with all this." Although, truth be told, the fighting _was_ giving him a feeling of exhilaration, the likes of which he hadn't felt since the end of the war... 

"Not exactly my idea of fun, either," Shinn shot back, sending twin beams scorching at Chaos' gunbarrels. "But we're stuck with it, aren't we?" Using Sturm Vogel's back as an impromptu springboard, he shoved off, dashing straight at Abyss. "Why are you out here, anyway? What's an Orb noble hoping to get out of all this?"

The Sturm Vogel put away a rifle, and drew a saber, igniting the blade of crimson energy. "Believe me," Kevin assured him, boosting toward Gaia, "I'm not doing this for you. Frankly, I _still_ think we'd all be better off if ZAFT collectively took a long walk off a short pier. Unfortunately, someone I swore to protect is on your ship, and so are a couple of very good friends of mine. And since I happen to be pretty decent in a mobile suit, I thought I'd help out."

"I don't need your help, Baron," Shinn snapped, triggering a pair of railgun shots at Abyss; they sped across space and slammed into the stolen unit, doing no permanent damage but forcing it away nonetheless. "In my experience, you Orb nobles are always useless."

"Is that so? News to me. I'll have you know that Blue Cosmos lost something on the order of two hundred people just trying to kill one man, several years ago. Believe me, I'm far from useless on the battlefield." The Sturm Vogel's saber slashed down at Gaia, only to come to a dead stip against its shield; in response, Stellar swept her own blade up and dragged its tip across the Sturm Vogel's left leg.

The black-haired pilot snorted. "If you're so good, then why are you doing so badly, huh?"

"I'll be the first to admit I'm not in top form right now," Kevin replied, slamming a foot into Gaia's head. "I'm out of practice, my augmentation is offline, and I'm flying an unfamiliar mobile suit. With my cybernetics active, in one of my personal machines, this would be a very different battle." _I'd settle for just having Nemesis here, really; that's what you get for sending it down to the base on Earth, you idiot. And even if _Dominion_ were anywhere in range, it'd take too long to flush the nitrogen atmosphere, recall the crew, and get her moving..._

He parried another fast cut, stopping it mere meters from the Sturm Vogel's face, and then had to fight for his concentration when a voice intruded into his skull again. _"I have seen your past, and your present,"_ the same voice from before whispered through his implant. _"What you must fear is not the future alone, but your past as it may yet become. To both sides, you represent the ideal of the warrior, and as such, you are the gravest threat to peace that exists on today's battlefield. As such, you have two choices: remain as you are, and die in the coming conflict, or become again the man you once were, the avatar of the Grim Reaper... the Angel of Death..."_

"Who are you?" Kevin demanded under his breath, slamming Sturm Vogel's left knee into Gaia's chest. "What are you trying to tell me?"

_"A friend... or a comrade... or a partner. Once upon a time, I was your shield, and your sword; now, I fight for you in the shadow world. Your enemies are legion, my Commander. Things fall apart, the center cannot hold. Peace is but a passing dream, while war returns again and again... And by the way, the enemy is now upon you..."_

His head snapped up, and he threw Sturm Vogel backwards just in time to avoid a wireless gunbarrel that swooped in on him, trying to bisect him with a beam saber. "They never used to do _that,"_ he muttered, swinging around to face the new threat.

"Kevin Walker, I presume," Neo murmured. "Let's see if you're really as good as the legend, why don't we?" Darting in with his Exus, he sent his gunbarrels spiraling around the Sturm Vogel, and fired both nose-mounted linear cannons, bombarding the machine with constant fire.

Kevin boosted away, dodging frantically amongst the beams and slugs and remembering unhappily what had happened the _last_ time he'd been in such a situation. _The last -and only- time I fought remote weapons was at Jachin, against Rau Le Creuset and his Providence... and even Stormhawk was nearly obliterated that day. If I hope to survive this, I better hope I've learned something... Wait a second, there's something familiar here... but what...?_

That was the drawback to relying too much on his instincts. Sometimes they presented him with mysteries he couldn't solve, but also couldn't keep out of his mind... something which would be fatal in this battle, if he didn't keep his mind on the mission.

The distraction nearly cost Kevin his life, but as another pair of linear cannon slugs came straight at his cockpit, something clicked in his mind... combat conditioning from years before, during his days as a ZAFT super-soldier. His body reacted without conscious thought, fingers moving across mobile suit controls in a pattern he didn't personally recall, but his body did...

Neo's eyebrows went up as he watched the Sturm Vogel apply thrust to dodge directly _beneath_ the oncoming rounds, and a saber reached up to obliterate one of them while the other sped harmlessly off into the depths of space. "I guess you _are_ as good as they say, kid," he radioed. "No wonder you've lasted this long against my people. But your lucky streak ends, now."

"Am I supposed to be impressed?" Actually, Kevin _was_ impressed... just not with his opponent. Rather, he was remembering Tanya "Harpy" Coleson, who had started his training in mobile weapons so long ago, and apparently left her influence deep in his subconscious even after all this time. "You're nothing but an insect, Natural. A mere human isn't enough to stop me."

Neo laughed outright. "A 'mere' human? Then what are _you,_ a Martian?"

"I'm an Abaddon, and that, comrade, is a soldier of a skill far beyond anything you've ever dealt with." Kevin smiled thinly. "You're dealing with a man who once incinerated himself. If you think I'm going to be impressed by anything this side of the grave, you've made a fatal mistake." He put away his saber, and lifted both beam rifles. "Are you ready?"

Neo fed power to his thrusters, sent his gunbarrels spiraling in, and smiled. "Time to cut you down to size, kid."

"Then come and die, scabrous dog." The muzzles of the Sturm Vogel's rifles began to glow...

* * *

The helmsman, Malik Yardbirds, cursed as he hauled on his controls. "We can't get clear, Captain," he grunted. "There's a large chunk of asteroid blocking our path!" 

Gladys stared hard at the screen; and behind her, Athrun's mind worked furiously. _There must be something we can do. Come on, we've been through worse situations than this; okay, not _much_ worse, but at least this isn't as bad as Jachin..._

His head came up as a new thought occurred to him. "Captain, how many starboard thrusters do we have left?" If his thought was right...

Gladys hesitated. "That's sensitive information, Mister Zala..."

Dullindal waved a hand. "Go ahead, Captain; there's nothing to be gained by keeping secrets at this point. We need all the ideas we can get."

She hesitated a moment longer, then nodded. "Very well. Mister Zala, we have six starboard thrusters operational; what is it you have in mind?"

Athrun took a deep breath; his idea was just slightly crazy, and he probably wouldn't have thought of it at all if he hadn't been around Kevin Walker so much, but... "I suggest you activate all starboard thrusters, and at the same time fire all starboard weaponry at the asteroid. That way, we can use the force of the explosion to get clear."

Trine's head snapped around. "What? But that's crazy! There's entirely too much of a chance that the explosion will destroy _us_ in the process!"

Leona snorted. "Better to die trying than sit by and let them shoot us. Besides, Kevin's out there doing his part, along with your own pilots; it's time we did ours."

Gladys nodded in agreement. "That's right. Malik, Chen, prepare to execute the maneuver on my command." _Crazy, maybe,_ she conceded inwardly. _But it's also just the sort of tactic he would've used, and his very survival is proof Kevin Walker knows what he's doing. Sometimes, you have to be unconventional..._

Dullindal, meanwhile, remained silent, simply observing the battle. "Are you seeing this, Delta?" he murmured, audible only to his throat mic.

_"Da,"_ Arkanian responded. _"I'm tapped into _Minerva_'s exterior cameras, now that I've done what I can about the gas. You do seem to be in a fascinating situation, Chairman."_

"Indeed. What do you make of your student's piloting?"

She made a faint noise of approval. _"Obviously he hasn't lost his touch... at least not completely. Judging from that last move he pulled, he still retains the combat conditioning we gave him five years ago; I recognized Harpy's touch. Not really a surprise, though, since after he started flying something more stable, he was only shot down twice in the last war. First by Athrun Zala's self-destructing mobile suit, and then by that lunatic Le Creuset's Providence."_

"You think he'll survive?" Dullindal had already seen the Sturm Vogel take a hit to the leg, and he was now engaged in a running duel with the enemy mobile armor; with the gunbarrels flying everywhere, the situation was undoubtedly less than ideal, as far as the Baron was concerned.

Arkanian snorted. _"Survive? I told you before, Chairman, that man will not die. I don't know what Oracle did to him -every man who did is dead, and that bastard never kept precise records- but it's pretty clear there's more in there than I was ever told. _Something_ keeps bringing him back from the dead, even after he incinerated himself."_

He nodded imperceptibly. "Point. Now... is there any chance we can bring him back into the fold?"

Another, louder snort. _"Back in ZAFT, you mean? Not a chance. There's a remote possibility you could convince him to join forces with us, but never as a ZAFT member. He takes orders from no one, Chairman, and none of his people would ever take orders from anyone save Hydra himself and Medusa, his exec. They were loyal more to him than to ZAFT, and he is loyal to Cagalli Yula Athha more than anything."_

"Surely he'd take orders from his own government..."

_"In some respects, he _is_ his government, Chairman. He is head of one of the Five Noble Families, and has effectively complete control of Morgenroete. Also, his record from the war is clear enough: he is loyal to no government, nation, or organization, beyond whatever his own scheming has led to. He will obey Lady Cagalli's orders, but no other."_

Dullindal nodded thoughtfully. Obviously, Arkanian had been spending the time since the attack studying her student's mid- and post-war actions, deciphering behavioral patterns. It would probably be valuable...

"Captain, we still have two Dagger Ls firing on us," the sensor operator, Burt Heim, warned. "Our mobile suits are not in a position to intercept..."

Gladys nodded. "Understood. Meyrin, have Rey launch in his ZAKU Phantom; we need to get them off us if this plan is to succeed."

"Yes, Ma'am."

* * *

Down in the hangar, Alec watched with a certain amount of interest as Rey Za Burrel pulled himself into his white ZAKU Phantom, equipped with the "Blaze" weapons pack. _Heading out to help the Commander and the hotheaded kid,_ he thought to himself. _But... there's something strange about that guy. Well, not important right now._

He observed the Phantom heading for the catapult, then began to turn away, and as he did so, the head mechanic, Mad Abes, called out to him. "Hey, Kyle! Get over here; we've got work to do."

Alec pushed off toward his nominal superior, who stood in front of one of the other ZAKUs, for which they had no pilot. "What is it, Boss?"

"We've got orders from the Chairman; seems he wants us to repaint one of these things." Abes shook his head. "Repainting in the middle of a battle... Anyway, we're supposed to turn this thing steel gray, and put some kind of emblem on it; it was used by the Next-Generation Special Forces, apparently, before the unit was disbanded."

Basilisk shook his head in confusion. "Let me get this straight, Boss. We're supposed to paint a machine we don't even have a pilot for in colors of a unit that hasn't existed for two years? _And_ in the middle of a battle no less? That's... weird."

"Hey, I'm just telling you what they told me, Kyle. What the hey, it's not like we've got anything better to do."

Alec shrugged, and turned his attention to the task... while a sliver of his mind contemplated the fact that, while the NGSF itself might no longer exist, one of its former members was aboard _Minerva_ at that very moment...

Inside the catapult, Rey was receiving instructions from Meyrin. _"Rey, your first priority is the mobile suits attacking the ship; if we can get them out of the way, we've got a chance of breaking free. Also, if you have the chance, support the Sturm Vogel. Baron Onishi is holding his own, but he's out of practice, operating with an unfamiliar mobile suit."_

Rey nodded. "Roger that. Rey Za Burrel, launching."

* * *

Chaos' gunbarrels spiraled in toward Impulse, and Shinn threw himself to one side just as they opened up on him. Emerald beams went harmlessly to one side, and his CIWS ripped off a quick burst, tearing a missile swarm to pieces. "You'll have to do better than that!" 

Auel fired a powerful red-orange beam from his multiphase energy cannon, and cursed when Impulse ducked beneath it. "I just don't understand what's going on," he complained. "It's three against one out here!"

"Yeah," Sting agreed, annoyed. "Why can't we take down one mobile suit?" He almost said more, but bit it off as he whirled around a quick shot from Impulse's beam cannons. "This just isn't right!"

Nearby, Kevin dueled with Neo's Exus, weaving among the web of laser fire the mobile armor's gunbarrels spat at him, unpleasant memories of Jachin Due going through his mind. _If that thing had a few more remote units, I'd be dead,_ he thought grimly, firing a pair of emerald blasts at one of them. _I _knew_ I should've brought that Proto Chaos along, and to hell with Cagalli's reaction..._ His organization at Artemis had clandestinely purchased one of the prototype mobile armors ZAFT had used to test several of the Chaos' systems; in their pursuit of technological advancement, it had seemed prudent. Via certain contacts in ZAFT's research and development, his subordinates had access to most of the military research going on in the world... and he didn't think Earth Forces technology was worth bothering with anyway.

Not that any of it helped him _here._

"I just don't know what to make of you, kid," Neo remarked, triggering a pair of linear cannon slugs on a direct path for the Sturm Vogel's cockpit. "Sometimes you're good, sometimes you're like the worst pilot I ever saw..."

"I've got bad luck with mobile suits, that's all," Kevin grunted, turning sideways to let the projectiles speed past; though one of them grazed his machine's upper torso on its way by. "If I were in my preferred machine, we wouldn't be having this conversation."

The masked pilot snorted. "Yeah, sure. Lucky for me, your 'preferred machine' got blown up two years ago... assuming you really _are_ Kevin Walker."

"If you can give me one good reason someone would want to impersonate me, you might have a point," the Baron shot back, twisting away from a gunbarrel barrage and retaliating with a pair of his own beams. "As it is, I can't think of any reason anyone would want to put themselves at risk by claiming to be me." He uttered a Russian imprecation a moment later, and one of the Exus' gunbarrels swooped past, ignited its beam sabers, and melted clean through his right hand rifle, reducing it to molten scrap which he hurriedly tossed away, before it exploded._ That's it,_ he thought, disgusted. _Next time we make one of these diplomatic trips, we take something a little more powerful along. Nemesis, preferably, and I don't even care how loud Cagalli screams over it..._

Neo smiled, seeing his enemy's firepower cut in half. "Okay, kid, time to finish this." His gunbarrels spiraled in, his fingers tightened on the triggers...

And a Dagger L blew up.

His head snapped around, just in time to see a white ZAKU Phantom dash out of the debris. "Get clear, Baron," Rey called out. "I can handle this from here!"

"Not a chance," Kevin snapped back. "I can still move; I can still fly." He muttered something under his breath about a lack of respect for one's elders, and turned his attention back to the Exus. "You worry about that other Dagger; I've got this insect."

Rey shook his head, bemused by the older pilot's stubbornness, and boosted off toward the surviving Dagger L. _If he wants to try and get himself killed, that's his business..._

Neo watched him go, but took a moment before even attempting to pursue. _That feeling again... what _is_ this? Who _is_ that pilot, anyway?_ He shook his head, dismissing the peculiar sensation, and rocketed after the Phantom... only to have his path blocked by the Sturm Vogel. "Out of my way, kid," he radioed. "Or do you _want_ to die?"

"You're not getting past me, you insect," Kevin said calmly. "You can run, you can fight, or you can die. Choices one and two both lead to choice three, by the way."

Neo shook his head. "Cocky, are we? Then let me change your mind."

* * *

Leona had to smile in amusement at her comrade's radio chatter. She'd heard of his reputation for creative insults during battle -apparently a psychological warfare technique on his part- but this was the first time she'd actually seen it for herself. _"Scabrous dog"? Just what does he think he is, a pirate? Come to think of it, he may have _been _one at some point._ Even after two years back in the public view, Kevin still spoke little of what he'd done in the year between the loss of his original right eye and his arrival on Heliopolis... 

"Bogey One moving to intercept us," Heim called, interrupting her thoughts. "Energy readings consistent with charged beam cannons..."

Gladys nodded. "Then let's not keep them waiting. Chen, charge Tristans and the Tannhauser; Malik, prepare all starboard thrusters. Execute!"

Helm and Fire Control responded simultaneously, all six starboard engines firing while the starboard Tristan beam cannons opened up on the asteroid blocking their path. Weapons meant to tear through heavily-armored warships bored through rock with explosive fury, ripping it apart... and suddenly, as pieces of rock went everywhere, Bogey One was right in front of them.

If ships had expressions, Bogey One would've looked shocked.

Clearly, the ship had been preparing to fire on them, but the sudden destruction of the asteroid -and the potential for damage its remains represented- gave them sufficient pause that _Minerva_'s lone high-powered positron cannon had enough time to finish charging.

"Fire Tannhauser," Gladys ordered.

Whoever was commanding Bogey One clearly was not stupid; the ship's bow swung away in a desperate attempt to get clear, but it was too little, too late. From the newly-emerged cannon in the center of _Minerva_'s bow, a powerful stream of red-orange fire, literally a focused antimatter barrage, streaked through space, briefly connecting the two vessels with a bright, thick line.

Two of Bogey One's starboard beam cannons were blown off outright; the rest of the starboard weaponry evidently suffered similar damage, and air was clearly leaking from compartments exposed to vacuum. The ship herself staggered in space, continuing her original turn but in a more haphazard fashion.

"Perhaps that will give them pause," Gladys said in satisfaction. "If they don't retreat, then they've either a great deal of courage or even less sense than I give them credit for."

Athrun shook his head. "This reminds me of something the _Archangel_ did to us in the war, when I was flying off the _Vesalius._ They forced us into retreat by sending a Moebius Zero to ambush _Vesalius,_ then firing both Lohengrin positron cannons. Commander Le Creuset got them out of the path of one, but the second... Well, if this is anything like that incident, they should be ordering a retreat soon."

"Except," Leona remarked, "that I thought the objective here was to retrieve the three machines they stole?"

Gladys shook her head. "That's the idea, yes, but under the circumstances we need time to regroup. We don't have enough pilots as it is, and we just lost one of our machines; also, Baron Onishi's unit has taken damage that will need to be repaired. No, we'll get them, but not today."

* * *

_"Serious damage to starboard side, Captain,"_ Lee reported to Neo. _"Continued combat may not be advisable at this time."_

That was something of an understatement, as far as Neo was concerned; also a very annoying situation. He took another look at the Sturm Vogel -and, out of the corner of his eye, saw the other Dagger L succumb to a missile barrage from the Phantom- and sighed. "You're right, Ian. Signal a retreat; we're getting out of here."

_"Yes, Sir."_

Neo smiled, and threw an ironic salute to the Sturm Vogel as he recalled his gunbarrels. "Not bad, kid. Till we meet again."

Kevin watched the Exus go with mixed emotions. On the one hand, its departure meant safety for those he fought to protect; on the other, there was still something odd about that pilot, which he was determined to track down. And... he realized now that he had felt more alive during that battle than he had in almost two years. The call to battle still sang within his veins...

"We'll meet again, all right," he murmured. "Even if I have to send _Dominion_ to track you down..." He turned, and fed power to his thrusters on a return course to the _Minerva._

* * *

Gladys sighed in relief and leaned back in her chair as the three stolen machines abruptly paused in their attacks, turned about, and boosted back toward Bogey One. "Well, I guess it's over, for now..." 

"Captain," Meyrin called, "Impulse and Luna's ZAKU are nearly out of power; also, Baron Onishi's unit is running low, and suffering minor damage to several areas."

Gladys nodded. "Very well. Signal them to return aboard immediately."

Dullindal inclined his head. "This isn't over, Captain," he said quietly. "This may have ended as a draw, but we'll still have our chance."

"You really think you can still catch them?" Leona wondered aloud. "They've proven quite resistant to capture and destruction so far."

"They can't run forever, Commander Colde," he said quietly. "And we _have_ dealt serious damage to their ship. Tell me, what do you think the Baron would do, under the circumstances? Give up, or keep trying until he got it right?"

She merely gave him a look. "If he still had access to the sort of firepower he had at his disposal two years ago, the _first_ try would've been enough, Chairman. One does not anger him lightly."

"So I gather." Dullindal turned away, and lowered his voice. "Well, Delta? What did you think of that little incident?"

_"If you're speaking of my old student, I think he's a little rusty, but doing reasonably well. I also think that if you intend to do anything with -or about- him, you'd better do it very carefully. His piloting may have atrophied in two years, but his instincts most certainly have not."_

"And if I have a role planned for him?"

Arkanian laughed. _"If you do, Chairman, I suggest you leave him to me. I may be the only person still alive who can handle that soldier when he gets stubborn; back during the Project, he threw his teammates around like rag dolls, but I was always able to cut him down to size."_

"I'll remember that," Dullindal murmured. Oh, he'd _certainly_ remember it...

* * *

A couple of hours later, they were once again in the same compartment where they'd met earlier, before the battle. "A rescue ship from Armory One will be coming to retrieve you and your bodyguards, Lady Cagalli," Gladys informed Cagalli. "I apologize for the inconvenience." 

The younger woman nodded. "Thank you, Captain. Although," she added in a wry tone, "I think I learned more from this situation than I would have otherwise."

Dullindal smiled. "Probably so, Lady Cagalli." He turned to Athrun. "You saved us all back there, Athrun Zala. You have my thanks."

Athrun shifted uneasily. "Maybe so," he conceded, "but I think I overstepped my bounds, and I apologize for that."

Gladys shook her head. "You have nothing to apologize for, Mister Zala. I'm grateful for your assistance. And yours," she added, nodding at Kevin. "It seems you haven't completely lost your touch, Baron."

He gazed back at her impassively. "Maybe not... but it still came closer than I preferred. You want to thank anyone, thank Athrun, because I, quite frankly, nearly got myself killed pulling that stunt. I don't know who that mobile armor pilot was, but he was good."

"Yet not good enough to actually defeat you," Dullindal pointed out... and hesitated, recalling something else that had come to his attention since the battle had ended. "By the way, Baron... I'm afraid I have bad news for you. We received word from Orb an hour ago, concerning an event in your capital."

Kevin tensed, his eyes becoming instantly wary. "What kind of bad news?" he asked cautiously.

The Chairman sighed. "I'm sorry, Baron, but Frank Castile was found dead earlier today, shot through the chest in his office."

The words failed to register at first, but then Cagalli, Athrun, and Leona took a collective step back as his jade eyes went slit-pupiled, in an instinctive zoanthrope transformation that he instantly throttled back... but there was no denying the sudden fury in his body language, and, more telling, his cold jade eyes. "Frank is dead?" he whispered, voice colder than Cagalli had heard it in years. "Who? Why?"

Dullindal shook his head. "Apparently that's not clear as of yet. Others within the building were alerted by the gunfire, but by the time they arrived, the assailant was already gone. All they found were his secretary, shot through the head, and Castile himself, bleeding out in his chair. Apparently the attacker was using some sort of jamming device, as there is no surveillance footage of the event, but it seems it wasn't all one-sided; Agent Castile's pistol had fired one round. Unfortunately, though he apparently knew who had shot him, he didn't live long enough to pass it along. His last words were, 'Baron Onishi... Baron Onishi. Tell Kevin.' The people who found him believe he was trying to pass a message to you, but didn't have time."

Kevin felt an even hotter spike of rage at that. _You're wrong,_ he thought savagely. _He _did_ get me the message. You bastard... five years it's been, and _now_ you come back to ruin my life? You must be the one who unleashed that virus... and now you've killed Frank. Well, I've got news for you: I'm a lot different from how you remember, and you've just made the biggest mistake of your life. I swear, you _will_ die for this!_

Cagalli laid a hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry, Kevin," she said quietly. "We'll find who did it, I promise."

Leona merely looked at him in silence, her face betraying nothing.

He took a deep breath, let it out, and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, we will." Though he rather suspected Cagalli had a... gentler form of justice in mind than he did. If it was who he thought it was, he wouldn't bother with any formalities._ Just a thrust to the heart, or a shot to the brain..._ He moodily shook his head. "Excuse me, Captain, Chairman, but I need to go someplace and think; today's been... Well, you understand."

Gladys nodded. "I do indeed, Baron. There's a lounge aboard, where you should have some peace and quiet; we're a little undermanned at the moment, and the people we _do_ have will probably be busy for a while repairing damage from the battle."

"Thank you." Kevin nodded to them, smiled briefly at Cagalli, and left.

Cagalli watched him go, concerned. _Kevin... it's coming back to you, isn't it? Everything you've done in the past five years... you still can't let it go..._

* * *

Kevin wasn't very surprised when Athrun entered the lounge not long after; like him, Patrick Zala's son had his own ghosts from the last war. _Some of which we share,_ he thought, brooding. The first act in the war that he truly regretted had been a column of azure lightning pouring from the muzzle of his twin buster rifle, engulfing GAT-X207 Blitz, and its pilot, Nicol Amalfi. He'd known Nicol once, years before; realizing that he had been responsible for the pianist's demise hadn't been easy. 

He hadn't let it stop him, though; back then, every death was just one more body in the dirt, one more number added to the hundreds before. Death was something that affected him little; killing came as easily as breathing, and those who fought him paid the price.

Even now, Kevin was quick to shoot to kill, if the need arose, but he truly was tired of all the killing. Battle he enjoyed... killing he did not. He'd do it... but he wouldn't revel in it, as he once had. He shuddered then, remembering his time between ABADDON and joining Kira on Heliopolis. The things he'd done then... and before that, when ABADDON failed. Charlie Evans, Simon Priest, Erica Hawke... Rachel Carver. Then his own brother -or so he'd believed at the time- Mike Carnehan, who had come for him in Banadiya, intent on revenge...

That was something he still didn't understand. The Kraken he'd met there had _not_ been the same one he'd known in the Project; the rhetoric he'd spouted then didn't fit with what Kevin remembered of ABADDON. A desire for revenge he could understand, but... It was like something had driven him mad. _I'll probably never know,_ he thought, resigned. _It's too late to ask him. Ours not to reason why, ours not to make reply... ours but to do and die..._

"How did it come to this, Kevin?" Athrun asked suddenly, voice quiet. "How is it... that we survived, when so many others died? Rusty, Miguel, Nicol... and even Commander La Flaga. Why them... while we survived?"

Kevin sighed. "I honestly don't know, tovarisch. We both had our share of close calls. Murrue nearly shot you on Heliopolis, you almost blew yourself up with the Aegis... and me? I _did_ die, twice. What am I doing here, instead of Cagalli's father? Or one of my teammates, like Rachel. She... she would've fit right in on the _Archangel,_ I think, but now we'll never know..."

His friend looked him in the eye. "You still aren't over her, are you?"

The Baron swallowed. "Not completely," he conceded. "I wouldn't still love her -it was Hydra who did, not me- but she _would_ be a close friend. And for her to die that way, with her throat torn out by my own fangs..."

Athrun nodded. "I understand."

They understood each other well, in fact. They both had their demons; they'd both done things they'd forever regret. Brought together by the vagaries of their studies in early life, their friendship had been solidified by blood, when they finally fought together on the front lines of the final battles of the Earth/ZAFT War. It was a bond that would not be easily broken.

Leona just watched the two brood, hearing their conversation, from the entrance of the lounge, before she walked back to their temporary quarters leaving the two to their silent musings.

* * *

It was a weary trio of pilots who made their way down the corridor from the hangar, long after the battle was over. Shinn, Rey, and Luna had changed out of their flightsuits, after helping to get their machines squared away, and now looked forward to nothing more than a little rest. Two combat sorties in a single day had really taken it out of them. 

"I'm so tired..." Luna groaned. "Maybe we only got a draw out there, but at least now we can get some rest..."

"Yeah," Shinn agreed. "And at least we're still alive." That was itself a minor miracle, under the circumstances; and he -grudgingly- admitted that the Orb baron had had a part in that. Whatever else he was, he wasn't a coward... though taking on an Exus all by himself might've indicated that he was a little _too_ eager to help out. _Of course, no skin off _my_ nose if he gets himself killed..._

Rey, predictably, said nothing; he was a quiet sort, who seemed to have no opinion of the Baron either way.

Someone else, however, _did_ have something to say. "Hey, guys!" Meyrin called, coming down the corridor toward them. "You'll never believe what I heard on the Bridge during that battle!"

Luna looked at her curiously. "What is it, Meyrin? What are you so excited about?"

Her younger sister, forced herself to calm down... a little. "Guys, that Alex Dino... is really Athrun Zala! And... the Baron is our sister's old commander!"

Shinn shrugged. "We knew that already. Well, we _suspected_ that Dino was really Zala, but the Baron admitted outright that he was Kevin Walker." His voice hardened. "And it was Walker who was responsible for the deaths of the ABADDON participants."

Meyrin stared at him. "You're kidding."

Luna sighed. "Let's not jump to conclusions, Shinn. I know he didn't deny doing it, but he also didn't give us the full story. The guy Erica talked about _wasn't_ the kind of guy who would just murder his teammates like that; there must've been something else going on. Even if he did it, well, you heard him: the things that were done to him..." She glanced away. "But I guess you've got a point. I'm not sure I'd trust him behind my back..."

She trailed off, for they were now coming to the very lounge where Kevin and Athrun sat, staring off into space. They appeared to be deep in thought... not that Shinn cared. "So," he said bluntly, "are you really Athrun Zala?"

Athrun looked up in surprise. "Shinn...?" He gazed at him for a moment, then shrugged. "I'm Alex Dino, Shinn. Nothing more, nothing less. What I was in the past doesn't matter... not anymore."

The younger pilot snorted. "As if a guy from Orb would understand anything. Ha! Fat chance."

Kevin looked at him shrewdly. "Is that so, Asuka? Well, then, maybe you should just keep your trap shut, since I seem to recall _you're_ from Orb, yourself."

"That's right," Shinn grated, crimson eyes flashing. "Not that I have anything to say to _you,_ anyway."

Luna raised a hand, as if to forestall further arguing, and spoke to Kevin. "Baron... is it true?" she asked hesitantly. "Is it true that you... killed our sister?" She held her breath, almost afraid of the answer.

Kevin slowly stood. "Lunamaria," he began, "there's something you need to understand. You've been thinking of me like some white knight, like some fairytale hero, all this time. Well, I've got news for you: they're called fairytale heroes because they don't really exist. My armor is tarnished; I'm no one's hero. I have a friend who _is_ a hero... but you'll find that it's never that simple. War leaves no one untouched, and no soldier ever comes out of it without doing _something_ he regrets, unless he's some rear-echelon desk jockey. My friend regretted some lives he couldn't save... and some lives he took. Me? I did a lot of things I'm not proud of, some of which will haunt me to my grave, assuming I can ever stay in it. Two years ago, I killed a ZAFT soldier whom I'd once called friend; I annihilated his mobile suit with a single shot from my own unit. I was also unable to save the father of the one who means the most to me. And... I couldn't save my teammates at ABADDON."

Shinn glared at him. "You didn't even want-"

Kevin's left hand came up, a revolver held easily within it, and he aimed it toward the young pilot without even looking. "If you finish that sentence, we'll all be breathing the contents of your skull," he said quietly. "Do keep that in mind."

Shinn considered saying something more... but in the end decided it wasn't worth it. _He means it,_ he realized unhappily. _Guess even someone like him can only be pushed so far... but one day he'll get what's coming to him anyway..._

The revolver disappeared, and the Baron looked back at Luna. "It was my hand that did the deed," he said evenly. "And I will regret that for the rest of my life. But it was _not_ my mind in control. It was a raging beast unleashed by the casual cruelty of Commander Harris, and the twisted genetics within my own body. I killed them... but it wasn't because I wanted to." His voice fell to a whisper. "It was because I literally couldn't stop my own body, even as I watched helplessly while it killed."

Kevin clenched his cybernetic fist abruptly, and left, leaving a conflicted Meyrin and Luna in his wake.

Shinn merely snorted. "Nice excuse," he sneered, and also left... though he conspicuously took a different route from the Baron.

Athrun sighed. "I suggest you listen to Kevin," he said quietly. "I've known him for most of my life, and I can tell you that what he did five years ago _does_ weigh on his mind. I don't know exactly what happened there -I don't think even he does, anymore- but I can tell you that what he just said is exactly what he believes."

The Hawke sisters exchanged glances, but said nothing. Such a shocking admission would take much pondering, before even they could decide how they felt about it.

* * *

Shinn stormed away from the lounge, disgusted with Athrun Zala but even more disgusted with Kevin Onishi. _Walker,_ he told himself, arriving at the hatch to his quarters. _Whatever he might call himself now, he is, and will always be, Kevin Walker... the traitor._

And not just to ZAFT, he brooded, dropping onto his bunk. Even after that, there'd been the Battle of orb, when his home nation had been overrun by the Earth Alliance. If the Orb nobles had done their job, the nation wouldn't have fallen... and his family would still be alive.

Shinn could remember that day like it was yesterday. Running from the battle area, seeing his sister's cell phone tumble down a hill, running to retrieve it for her... and then the searing bolt of pure azure light, a bolt of synthetic lightning crashing down so close it nearly burned him alive...and it _had_ killed his parents and his sister Mayu.

He'd never yet found out which mobile suit had fired the shot; he hadn't been watching the sky just then. But since most units on both sides used _green_ energy weapons, it probably wouldn't be too hard to track who it was. And when he found out... Well, Kevin Walker wasn't the only one with a taste for revenge...

Swallowing hard at the memories, Shinn picked up the pink cell phone which he still kept, even after two years, and held it to his ear. Still recorded within was a voice mail message, and so, tears leaking from his eyes, Shinn Asuka listened to his sister's voice one more time...

* * *

Over a thousand kilometers away from the _Minerva,_ a small, powerful fighter prowled the Debris Belt, moving slowly and with optical camouflage online. The armored soldier known as Hyperion sensed that another battle was coming, and this time the soldier's own intervention might be required. Therefore, it was wise to top of the fighter's reactor mass; the fission generator was good enough for long cruises and as a backup, but for a battle, Hyperion preferred to have maximum power available for both weapons and the powerful engines. Fortunately, a fusion reactor could use almost anything as reaction mass, and the Debris Belt had any number of possible sources. 

Right now, Hyperion was cruising near the remains of Junius Seven. The soldier recalled that the _Archangel_ had found water here, and that would be ideal for feeding the reactor. Also, there had been rumors of late that a certain thief had been spotted in this area, and if the so-called "Star Thief" was indeed here, Hyperion wanted to deal with the threat expeditiously. A person with such an unsavory reputation could well pose a threat to Kevin Walker, and that was something Hyperion refused to permit.

However, examining the readings from the fighter's sophisticated instruments, Hyperion began to realize there was a more immediate threat: the soldier was detecting signs of mobile suits... and a definite change in the orbit of Junius Seven's remains.

_That's not good,_ the soldier thought, mind racing. _If that crashes into Earth, the damage could well result in a nuclear winter... and even if it doesn't, the Earth Alliance will be sure to blame the PLANTs for this. If this isn't a no-win situation, I don't know what is... Kevin has to be warned._

The fighter came about, the fission generator began supplying more power to the twin engines, and they ignited in a blaze of light as Hyperion set out to do something about what could well be the greatest disaster in the history of mankind...

* * *

Author's note: In the aftermath of the attack on Armory One, the clone known as Jack Carter prepares to arrive on the scene... but for what purpose? Meanwhile, the _Minerva_ has driven off _Girty Lue,_ Kevin Onishi begins to come to grips with his own participation in the conflict... and trouble brews in the Debris Belt. 

Yes, I know, this chapter took rather longer than I would've preferred, but I'm afraid the heat is getting to be a real annoyance as far as writing is concerned. In any case, at least I _have_ finished it, and have finally explained what happened to Flay after the war. Happy? Anyway, I'll _try_ to get the next one written a little faster; this heat wave can't last forever. In the meantime, let me know what you think. -Solid Shark


	5. Chapter 5: Heaven and Earth Collide

1I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, and Frank Castile

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"After researching the matter for the better part of two years now, I find it morbidly fascinating to think of that madman Hibiki's work. He collaborated with my father in my creation, and produced Kira Yamato on his own; the thought of what he could have done if he'd lived long enough is a matter I choose not to think on. As it is, the consequences of his work will live on for a very long time... and not just Kira and I. I won't forget my first meeting with Hibiki's first success -or failure, as some would say- and I doubt he will, either._

_"He came looking for my best friend, and he was good, but he couldn't hide from the likes of me. He learned his lesson that day, when he tried to pit his strength, as Kira's predecessor, against mine; and if the broken bones weren't sufficient to get his attention, the x-shaped scar my arm blade left on his face will be a constant reminder._

_"Such are the ways we meet those we come to rely upon..."_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_"In all my life, living in both my native homeland of France in Earth and amongst the sea of stars in the PLANTS, I have only truly regretted one thing._

_"I never regretted persuading my parents, as a five year old child, to go to the park with me, which resulted in their deaths as victims of a Blue Cosmos attack._

_"I never regretted the first time I killed a man, when he came out drunk from a bar and accosted me, and then tried to rape me._

_"I never regretted not shedding any tears for my fallen comrades in the battles of JOSH-A, Boaz, and Jachin Due._

_"I never regretted defecting from ZAFT after that madman, Patrick Zala, tried to commit genocide against an entire race._

_"And most of all, I never regretted standing by my new found friends/allies/family when the flames of a second war were ignited once again._

_"No, my one true regret was my decision to join ZAFT in the first place. I became a dog of the military, not for the noble goal of protecting the people of the PLANTS, or for the sake of racial superiority, but for the sake of my own personal quest for vengeance._

_"That was why I disliked ZAFT ace pilot, Shinn Asuka, when we met for the first time after the first battle of the Second War, the Battle of Armory One. From the mannerisms I observed from him in his encounter with her Highness, and his subsequent beatdown by Kevin Walker, then Kevin Onishi. His pride and arrogance could easily be used to manipulate him and his exaggeration of his own personal tragedy irritated me greatly._

_"But the fact that he became a dog of the ZAFT military for all the wrong reasons was the true reason that I antagonized him throughout the whole Second War..._

_"Because his thirst for vengeance reminded me so much of myself because I joined ZAFT for all the wrong reasons as well... becoming a dog of the military..."_

Leona Colde, excerpt taken from Chapt. 13: Hard Luck Woman found in _'The Tragic Spiral of War'_

* * *

_It had taken six months of careful, gradual training to get the wounded soldier back to full health, and another month after that to dust off the old skills. But now, the soldier was nearly ready to leave the Mendel Colony at last._

_"That's about all we can do, my friend," Mike said quietly. "We're both as fit as we can be, you're healed, so... I guess it's time for you to move out." He tilted his head, looking at his companion. "So, have you decided what you're going to use for a name, after you leave this place?"_

_The soldier nodded. "Yes," the soldier said firmly. "From this day forward, I'm Hyperion, named for one of the legendary Titans whose strength we bear. By our own actions, we deserve to be lost in the mists of history... so let my true name be forgotten by the world... by us."_

_Mike nodded. "You're right," he said quietly. "After everything that's happened, the only one of us who deserves to be remembered is Kevin, and I think he will be." He hesitated. "I've... got a couple pieces of advice, before you go. First of all, Kevin's finally resurfaced."_

_Hyperion looked at him sharply. "Really?"_

_"Yeah. Turned up in Banadiya not two weeks ago, using the alias Racher. The name he's using is Jack Carter, so if you keep an ear out for that, you should be able to track him. And..." Mike paused. "I don't think the lab was completely destroyed."_

_Now the soldier's eyes grew wide. "What? How... how is that possible?"_

_"Beats me, except I think Oracle used a smaller nuke than he was ordered to." He shrugged. "Anyway, if you go back there, you should be able to reconstruct some of the ABADDON tech research, create your own weapons for your mission."_

_"Yeah." Hyperion held out a hand. "Thanks, Mike. For everything."_

_"You're welcome. Now... go take care of him, okay? No matter what it takes... even if you have to fight _me." _Mike looked away. "You see... we won't meet again. At least, I hope we don't. Because I'm going to use my implants to erase all knowledge of your survival from my memory."_

_Hyperion gasped audibly. "Mike, no! You _know_ what that'll do to you! You do that, and-"_

_"I know," Mike said quietly. "It'll almost certainly drive me insane. Well, some things are worth that risk, my friend. This is one of them."_

_"But... you realize what will happen, if we meet again..."_

_He nodded. "If you catch me trying to hurt Kevin, Hyperion... I'm trusting you to do the right thing. I'm trusting you to kill me."_

_Hyperion swallowed hard. "I understand," the soldier whispered, and turned away. "Goodbye, Kraken... my friend..."_

_

* * *

_

The lights were low in the cabin on the _Minerva;_ the only illumination of note came from a pair of jade eyes, glowing in the dimness. The mind behind them was deep in thought, reflecting on the past. From five years ago, and from just an hour earlier, in the _Minerva_'s lounge...

Kevin stared at the metal fist, raised clenched before his eyes. Originally of flesh and blood, the entire arm had been replaced during the height of the war, following terrible injuries Jack Carter had inflicted. Once it had been part of the flesh that symbolized that even he was still human; now it was glaring evidence of the machine he had sought to forget.

_Why do I retain this?_ Kevin wondered. _My arm, my eye... I have the technology now to replace them with organics, but even now I resist, keeping the metal that I so despise. By what stubborn logic does _that_ make sense? Is it because of the same remnants that caused me to nearly provoke an international incident of cataclysmic proportions, or is it some corner of my mind that believes that a flesh and blood arm and eye would be just as fake as the metal..._

He had so many questions, and so few answers. Near the very end of the war, he'd begun to understand the enormity of what had been done to him, both genetically and cybernetically, and Project Prometheus Unchained, his private think-tank, had spent the past two years analyzing his body, determining what exactly had been done to him. Much had been learned, but questions remained... and all those who had the answers were dead. Mendel had provided some of the answers, but the scientists whose brains held the full truth were all dead; his own cortical implants had yielded much data about ABADDON, but only Jeffrey Harris had known it all, and his body had long since become fuel for the insatiable appetite of Kevin's augmentation power supply...

_Solkin syn,_ Kevin thought angrily, flexing the metal hand. _Father, you bastard! What the blazes did you do to me? Where did Snake Eater come from? If I die because only you and Hibiki knew enough about my genetics to find a cure, I'm going to haunt you for eternity..._

He looked up when the hatch to the cabin abruptly slid open. "Who-" he began, then broke off as his eyes and empathy recognized the intruder. "Alex, have you ever heard of knocking?"

"We need to talk," Athrun told him firmly, ignoring both the low lighting and the question. "Mind telling me what happened back there? You're lucky Shinn dislikes you enough for it to be personal."

Kevin shrugged. "ABADDON is still a thinly-healed wound, Alex," he said quietly. "Bringing it up again wasn't very smart of Asuka, that's all."

His friend stared at him. "What do you mean, _that's all?_ You pointed a gun at him and threatened to kill him if he didn't shut up! You don't just brush that off, Kevin! What if your finger had slipped, and you really _had_ shot him, huh?"

The jade eyes flicked toward him. "Technically, I didn't threaten to kill him. I just told him his brains would end up in the ventilation system; I never said I'd actually be the one to do it. I merely implied it." He smiled faintly, as Athrun gathered breath to explode at the remark. "And let me remind you of something, Alex: I don't make mistakes like that. Not ever."

"You're only human," Athrun retorted tightly. "Even you make mistakes."

"Not that kind. My training was very thorough, tovarisch, and my control over my body is second to no one alive. I _don't_ slip."

The blue-haired ex-pilot sighed; arguing with Kevin was always dicey. Even when the Baron seemed to be in the wrong, you could never be sure... "And if he _hadn't_ shut up?" he demanded. "Would you have killed him? I think I need to know the answer to that, Kevin."

"If he'd mentioned Rachel's name, I very well might have," Kevin said evenly. "That's a very touchy subject with me."

Athrun stared at him. "And then what? You'd have had Cagalli face the repercussions of that? Bad enough that it's now known she brought a man with a _known_ history of violence toward ZAFT with her to the PLANTs; if you'd _killed_ Shinn, can you _imagine_ what the consequences would've been?"

"I most certainly can," the Baron told him, voice sharp. "Probably better than you can, in fact. You grew up as a politician's son; _I_ grew up as a politician's son who was being groomed to be a politician himself, so I think I know a little about that kind of thing. What _you_ don't understand, Alex, is what I've been through lately. Yes, it would've been a bad thing. In fact, right now I'm very glad he shut up, because I'm not at all certain I would've held my fire. The punk deserved a little scare, but beyond that... No, Alex, I _don't_ want Cagalli to go through that. However, that nekulturny kid needs to learn a lesson in tact, before he has to learn another lesson on the battlefield."

Athrun's eyes narrowed. "That doesn't sound like the Baron I've known these last two years," he said quietly. "So who am I talking to? Kevin Onishi... or Kevin Walker? The Fencing Prince or the Black Asp?"

"I'm Hydra, Alex," Kevin said unflinchingly. "I was Hydra long before I was ever the Baron, and he and I are forever the same, whether my loyalty is to ZAFT or to my friends. The past doesn't die, Alex, any more than I do. I am, and will always be, who and what I am."

"I thought you put that behind you two years ago," Athrun said carefully. "I thought you came to terms with your past the day Azrael and the Chairman died."

"So did I, until I ran into someone wearing a Destroyer battlesuit and a Mark I PBW... until I met Alec King, brother of the girl I loved, whose blood was literally on my fangs." Kevin shook his head, flexing his hand again. "The past doesn't die," he said again. "No matter how hard I try to escape it, there will always be something there to remind me, as long as any from the Project survive. I don't have the old nightmares any more, but... in some ways, meeting Alec was worse. He was a good friend of mine, once, and maybe will be again... but every time I look at him, I'll remember what his sister and I shared, and how it ultimately ended."

The blue-haired "bodyguard" shook his head. "And because of all that, you nearly killed a man over words. That's not a good sign, Kevin."

"I _know_ that," Kevin said quietly, glancing at his friend with troubled eyes. "That's why I'm sitting here in the dark, trying to come to grips with the whole thing. I think I can control it for now, but one of these days, tovarisch, I have to reconcile my two halves, my double nature. One mind can't be two people at once; the strain of trying will tear me apart."

Athrun watched him for a moment, looking into those jade eyes. He was one of the few who knew the reason for the darkness within them; he also understood the pain. Bad memories were returning... and so was the faintest trace of the instability that had characterized the ex-super-soldier's first weeks on the _Archangel._

_Did the double life he's had to lead bring this about?_ he wondered. _Or is this the hidden side effect of Hibiki and Onishi's experiments... the tradeoff for Kevin's tremendous capabilities?_

"I'm sorry, Kevin," Athrun said at last, "but I have to ask you this: do you believe you can keep this in check? Because if you pull a stunt like that again, I _will_ bring Cagalli into this, and you _know_ how she'll react to it."

Kevin winced. "Yeah, Alex, I know how she'd react. She might even shoot me; based on past experience, that tends to straighten me out. But yeah. I can control it, now that I know the problem is there." He half-smiled. "And besides... I don't think we're done fighting. If battle comes again, I can expend my confusion on the enemy, vent my frustrations that way."

His friend snorted. "You always did like to do that. All right, Kevin, I'll leave it at that for now. But be careful, okay?"

"Alex, I haven't survived this long by being careless, or ignorant of my own mental state."

Athrun nodded at that, gripped Kevin's shoulder for a moment, and then left, feeling at least marginally reassured.

After he'd gone, the Baron stared into the darkness a few more moments, then raised his right arm. Unbeknownst to Cagalli -or just about anyone else outside a select group- that arm had a number of interesting gadgets built into it, from the two compartments with his "medicine" injector and cigarettes to the nanotech blade and a small holographic projector.

Now he was more interested in another device, which -after extracting and lighting a cigarette- he activated. Based on one of the devices implanted in his skull, it was a small quantum radio, which had the advantage of being untraceable by current technology and totally unaffected by Neutron-jammer interference; those qualities made it ideal for his current activity.

"It's me," Kevin murmured into the microphone built into his right wrist. "You hear me, Max?"

The projector in the forearm glowed to life, and a tall, black-haired woman with crimson eyes, wearing a black uniform of ZAFT styling but with peculiar insignia, appeared in the cabin. "Loud and clear, Boss," Max replied; originally created to ride herd on one of Kevin's friends as a battle computer, the world's only sentient artificial intelligence had become a valuable member of his hidden organization, as well as a citizen of Orb. "Something up?"

"Probably. You know the situation?"

She nodded. "Murrue got word to us just before we heard about Frank," she told him. "Armory One was attacked, and you guys are stuck on the _Minerva._ But I thought that was resolved?"

Kevin shrugged. "For now, things seem peaceful... but I've got an existential itch, Max. I don't think this is over; in fact, I think something even bigger is coming... so I'm hereby putting Prometheus Unchained on standby for Himmelkrieg."

Max "inhaled" sharply. "You're that worried, Boss?"

"Quite frankly... yes." He met her eyes. "I need to know the status of our current projects. Can anything be sent, if the worst case scenario occurs?"

She closed her eyes, clearly communing with other computers. "_Dominion_ is out of the question," she said after a few moments. "She's still sealed up tight, filled with a nitrogen atmosphere, with the crew scattered all over the place. Nemesis is also a problem, since you sent it down to the old base on Earth. _Prometheus_ is still under construction, with half her weapons yet to be installed and the powerplants offline. The Morgan... Morgan is a possibility. Cockpit pressurization is still iffy, but that doesn't matter."

Kevin nodded; that was about what he'd figured. "And Foxhound?"

Max shook her holographic head. "No way, Boss. Foxhound _is_ over eighty-percent complete, but there's no way it'll be finished _that_ fast. A few weeks yet, at least; and besides, you can't even fly it in your current condition."

He grimaced. "True enough. All right, Max, I guess it'll have to do. Get the Morgan moving this way as soon as you can, and tell Captain Daniels I want Foxhound loaded aboard _Conception_ and moving to Earth as soon as it's complete."

The AI nodded. "I'll pass it along, Boss. In the meantime, I take it you want me to launch Morgan?"

"Immediately. We're in the Debris Belt right now, so start heading this way; if my calculations are correct, Artemis is currently close enough to here for you to make it reasonably soon."

"Roger that." Max flipped him a salute, and vanished into the air.

Kevin sighed, and sat heavily on the cabin's bunk. Max was a loyal subordinate, and a good friend, but every time he saw the holographic form she'd chosen for herself... it was like seeing Rachel again, hale and pristine, looking just as she would've had she lived to be... How old would she be now? Twenty? It was enough to make his heart ache sometimes... But Cagalli was there for him, just as she always had been, before and after ABADDON.

The past might still live, but Kevin Onishi still had his future ahead of him, too.

* * *

Elsewhere in the Debris Belt, closer to _Minerva_'s position than her crew could've known, several GINN High Maneuver Mark II's stood upon the remains of Junius Seven, watching each other's backs as they went about their business. Their mobile suits belonged to ZAFT... but their mission was their own.

In the lead mobile suit, one man nodded to himself, watching his minions work on the flare motors that would push Junius Seven ever farther from her stable orbit, until the end of it all... "We will have our revenge upon the world," he whispered. "Our ideals were betrayed when Chairman Zala's plan was upset by the Four Ships Alliance, but now we have another chance... a chance to avenge his death, and Elizabeth's." He smiled to himself. "And what of you, Kevin Walker? If you've pulled another one, and survived Jachin... I hope you come here. It's been a long time, comrade, and I'd love the chance to take you out myself, for what you did."

The man chuckled to himself, enjoying the thought of killing the man he'd once known as Hydra, who had murdered Patrick Zala. What fine revenge it would be, to drop the colony on Earth even as the traitor burned for his crimes...

Unknown to the renegade, he, too, was being watched from afar, through the imaging systems of a mobile suit sniper rifle. Hidden on a chunk of rock by a prone posture behind an outcropping, the azure mobile suit -it looked like a suit of plate armor, but with spikes knees and toes, and wing-like crests on the helmet- watched the renegades work, and the pilot at the controls considered opening fire. But no... one ZAKU wouldn't make the difference, and it might make them cautious... and hasty. Better to wait until _he_ became aware of the situation, and then provide aid.

Just as the Destroyers had always done for their leader.

* * *

The intercom chimed in Talia Gladys' quarters, and Gilbert Durandal turned toward it. He'd been thinking on how to deal with the Baron Onishi situation -Shinn hadn't reported it, but he'd heard of the incident in the lounge, which at least indicated Hydra was still present in the Baron's mind in some form- but it now appeared there was something more urgent to deal with.

"What is it?" Gladys wondered from the cabin's bunk.

"I don't know." He moved to the panel, and hit the acceptance key. "Yes, this is the Chairman. What is it?"

_"We've received a message from the PLANTs, Sir,"_ Meyrin told him, sounding puzzled. _"We're getting a transmission directly from the Supreme Council itself."_

Durandal frowned. "Put it through, please."

_"Yes, Your Excellency."_

A few moments later, the face of one of the Supreme Council members appeared on the intercom screen. _"We have a problem, Mister Chairman,"_ he said without preamble, voice and face grim. _"One of ZAFT's observation posts in the Debris Belt has reported that Junius Seven's orbital path is becoming increasingly unstable. At this rate, it will reenter the Earth's atmosphere in a matter of days... maybe hours."_

Gladys' eyes widened. "That would be a disaster..." she whispered.

_"We have forces in range to intervene,"_ the Council member went on. _"What are your instructions, Chairman?"_

"We'll discuss things here first," Durandal informed him. "I also need to apprize the Orb representatives of the situation; once I've done so, _Minerva_ will mobilize to stop the event. Also, I think we'll need the assistance of the Joule team."

_"Understood, Chairman."_

Gladys sighed. "For a ship on her maiden voyage, we seem to be attracting a lot of disasters. And we still can't take the time to drop off Lady Cagalli's group, can we?"

Durandal shook his head. "No. But this may be an asset, in some ways; Kevin Onishi's presence is fortuitous, I think. No one aboard, not even Athrun Zala, has his battle record. Perhaps Shinn and the other pilots can learn from him."

"Only if he and Shinn don't kill each other first," she said dryly.

He nodded with a slight smile, and turned away, touching a finger to the small radio he once again wore. "Delta, have you heard?"

_"Da, Tovarisch Chairman. Quite the situation we have here, yes? I think perhaps this is not a natural phenomenon, either."_

"That much is obvious. Junius Seven's orbital path should've been stable for another century." Durandal paused. "Have you any suggestion, Natalya Ivanova?"

_"Stay on my pupil's good side, and accept his help when he offers it. And believe me, Chairman, he will: nothing matters to him more than the life of Cagalli Yula Athha, and he will do anything to protect her, against _any_ threat."_ Arkanian chuckled. _"That's the thing about Destroyers, Chairman: we can be killed, but that is the_ only_ way to stop us. In virtual reality simulations -which connected them directly to the computers, making them feel a part of it, including the pain- my students would keep on going no matter how much damage they took. To someone like Kevin Walker, a lost limb is a factor only in how it diminishes his combat capability; to him, pain means nothing."_ Her voice hardened. _"By the way... I suspect he may have a personal stake in this, whether he knows it or not. There was a man in our support unit, name of Sato, who was one of Zala's diehards. He survived the nuclear attack, went on to be the leader of Leona Colde's unit... and disappeared, following the war. It's only a hunch, but this is _exactly_ the sort of thing that man would do."_

He sighed. "Another of Oracle's plans backfired, hm? I told him it was a mistake to bring that man into this in the first place..."

_"Kevin Walker may have been Rau Le Creuset's greatest mistake,"_ Arkanian agreed. _"As near as I can determine, Kira Yamato may have been the shield of the Four Ships Alliance, but there's little doubt that my student was their sword. He and _Dominion..._ they were the weapon the Alliance unleashed when their target had been clearly defined, when the job _had_ to be accomplished. It was he who was sent into the very heart of GENESIS, he who killed Patrick Zala... his ship that killed Muruta Azrael. And, in my opinion, it was his 'death' that provoked Freedom's pilot into the killing rage that ended Le Creuset. So yes, I think Hydra was, in the end, Le Creuset's undoing... yet that could also be made to work _for_ us, Chairman: his sheer determination is rivaled only by Kira Yamato, and unlike Yamato, he is entirely willing to take it all the way to the end... to the death."_

_

* * *

_

Later, Durandal and Gladys once again met with Cagalli and her bodyguards in the same conference room as before. Kevin, Athrun noted, had noticeably recovered his composure; now he merely looked wary, obviously wondering what the emergency was. _He also looks like he's trying not to look too threatening,_ he mused. _Probably worried about the impression his arm is giving._ Kevin had, after all, effectively destroyed his cloak, and without synthetic flesh in place, his metal arm was constantly in plain view.

In any case, he was clearly in firm control of himself here, and he spoke quite calmly, taking point in the matter. "So what's going on, Chairman?" Kevin asked warily. "You didn't call us here for nothing."

"Yeah," Cagalli agreed. "The last time we spoke, you said a ship would be coming from Armory One to pick us up. Has something changed?"

"I'm afraid so, Lady Cagalli," Gladys said quietly. "We received word earlier today that the ruins of Junius Seven have shifted in their orbit, and are now spiraling in toward Earth."

Cagalli went white in shocked understanding, and Athrun swallowed. "But... I don't understand," he said in confusion. "Junius Seven's orbit was supposed to remain stable for another century at least, wasn't it? Why would it shift now?"

"Foul play, I suspect," Leona murmured, outwardly as unperturbed as ever but inwardly horrified at the thought of that much mass striking the planet at terminal velocity. "The consequences of such a thing..."

"Nuclear winter," Kevin said quietly, jade eyes thoughtful. "At best. I've had Morgenroete run studies on it before, in case someone ever _did_ try a colony drop. If something as massive as what's left of Junius Seven hits... Well, you can write off the coastlines altogether, and any place near a fault line... Survivors would be dealing with ash in the atmosphere, and a host of other problems..."

Durandal raised an eyebrow. "You're as thorough as I'd heard, Baron; only a man like you would've seriously considered the possibility of a colony drop. Most people find it unthinkable."

The Baron snorted. "You know what unthinkable really means, Chairman?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Unthinkable means that people find the possibility so horrifying that they don't want to think about it. So, they say that it's 'unthinkable', and so will never happen. I've never subscribed to that bilge. I'm a realist, not an idealist." He shook his head. "But I have to admit, even I'm surprised people would go to such lengths. I only ever met two men who would go that far for their goals, and I killed one of them personally." A quiet chuckle. "Maybe both; the other guy might not have been dead before my nuke went off..."

Cagalli swallowed. "But this... this is terrible! If the remains of Junius Seven do hit Earth...!" She turned wide eyes to Durandal. "If there's anything I can do to help, Chairman, I-"

"If we need Orb's help, we'll ask for it," Durandal cut her off, gently but firmly. "For now, this is our concern, not yours." He turned to leave... only to be cut off by a voice.

"Drek," Kevin said succinctly, head bowed. "Pure garbage, comrade. This is the world's business, not just ZAFT's. But if you want to play it that way... fine." His head came up, a peculiar light in his bright jade eyes. "If you won't accept Orb's help... then _I'm_ offering."

"I believe the Chairman just said-" Gladys began, but Kevin cut her off.

"I'm not just a Baron of Orb, Captain. That's nothing but word games. I'm a man, with every bit as much at stake in this as you. I don't care at all about ZAFT, or about your reputations or anything. You know how I feel about ZAFT, even now. But I care very much about the well-being of some people, and if I have to walk onto another battlefield to protect them, then so be it." His right eye flashed crimson for an instant, reminding those who saw it of the cybernetic nature of that eye. "If you won't accept Baron Onishi's help, then accept that of Kevin Walker."

Cagalli gasped, and Athrun looked at his friend in surprise. It had been a long time since Baron Kevin Onishi had claimed that name, and he, like Cagalli, had begun to think he never would again.

_But then... maybe this is his way of curing himself,_ Athrun thought then. _The shape his mind is in now... and it's true that he'd do anything to protect Cagalli. I would, too, but Kevin... this is what he devoted himself to a long time ago._

"Kevin..." Cagalli whispered. "Are you serious...?"

"I never joke about that, tovarisch," Kevin said quietly. "And I'm not now." He turned back to the Chairman. "Well? What's your answer, Chairman?"

Durandal merely looked back at him for a few moments, considering the younger man. It was, at times, easy to forget that he was a good three years older than he looked, and that he'd been on the battlefield most of his adolescent life. At an age when most children weren't even thinking about driving ground cars, this youth had trained to fly mobile suits and strike fighters, hack computer systems... and kill. At fourteen years old, he'd been strong enough and well-trained enough to kill four of his own kind in single combat, and smart enough to activate a thermonuclear fusion device despite safeguards that should've protected it from any outside intrusion without proper authorization codes.

He'd gone on to fight a running guerrilla war against Blue Cosmos across virtually the entire world, culminating in a tremendous battle at an abandoned military base, in which one man, not even sixteen years old, armed only with his hands, feet, and a pair of antique revolvers, had killed over a hundred well-armed terrorists along with two main battle tanks... and emerged completely unscathed.

Then he'd gotten involved in a war of a scale that was rivaled only by the vicious fighting of the Reconstruction War, and clawed his way even through that. A less resilient individual would've gone mad or been completely annihilated. Instead, the man whose every name was an alias had thrived on the chaos, and destroyed every single person who had hurt him or his friends...

Durandal looked the youth in the eye. "You're willing to do this?" he asked quietly.

Kevin gazed calmly back. "No one has ever asked me if I'm willing to step onto a battlefield," he replied, equally quiet. "I'll forget you asked it now."

Gladys glanced at the Chairman, received a nod, and looked back at the Baron. "All right, then, Baron. Thank you. When we arrive, I'll let you know."

Kevin nodded. "Understood."

Durandal watched him, carefully guarding his emotions against the empathic abilities he knew the young man had._ Yes, he _would_ understand,_ the Chairman thought to himself. _The only person I know with greater combat experience is Delta, and even she never faced the odds he did... And now, he's probably even more dangerous._ As the Orb visitors turned to leave, he allowed himself a small smile. _Hydra has found someone to protect, and to do it he'll use any means necessary, even if it costs him his life... again._

_

* * *

_

After returning to the quarters set aside for the four accidental passengers, Athrun and Leona discretely left for their own private chambers, giving Kevin and Cagalli some time to talk... time which the two bodyguards were sure they'd need, under the circumstances.

As soon as the hatch slid shut, Cagalli turned to Kevin with concern in her eyes. "Why, Kevin?" she asked quietly. "Why are you doing this? I thought, after the war ended..."

He sighed. "I'm sorry," he said with quiet sincerity. "I know you'd prefer I stayed out of the fighting, but... Cagalli, this is even bigger than the theft at Armory One. This isn't just about us, or about ZAFT and the Earth Forces. This is huge, and this ship needs all the help she can get if this is going to be stopped. Well, I happen to be uniquely suited for this kind of thing. However much we both dislike it, the fact is that I _am_ an experienced soldier, and this is a time for war."

"But since when do _you_ care about the world?" she demanded, almost desperately. "I thought you didn't care about the rest of the world, if you could just keep your friends safe..."

Kevin sighed again, took her hand, and pulled her close. "This _is_ about us," he whispered into her ear. "What kind of world will you live in if I let this happen? No, I _don't_ care about Chairman Durandal's problems, not really; but this affects Orb just as much as it affects the rest of the world, and right now, what happens to Orb happens to_ you."_ He stroked her hair. "I swore an oath a long time ago to protect you, and swore it again to Lord Uzumi before he died. I don't break my oaths, Cagalli, not ever. And certainly not now... because I love you."

Cagalli, head resting against his shoulder, blinked in surprise. Kevin was a professional paranoid, the more so since reclaiming his noble title, and because of the way they had to conceal their true relationship, it was _extremely_ rare for him to actually say it, lest someone -or someone's audio bugs- hear it, and use it against them. For him to speak of it aloud, he had to be very, very serious about what he was saying.

She closed her eyes, leaning into his embrace. "I know, Kevin," she murmured, "but... it'll be dangerous out there, more dangerous than anything you've done since the war ended. I... I can't take losing you again, Kevin!"

"You're not going to lose me," Kevin said soothingly. "I haven't used up all nine lives yet, and you know what made the hydra of myth so fearsome: cut off one head, and two more take its place. I won't die out there, Cagalli; not while I still have something to come home to." He pulled back a few centimeters, and his jade eyes met her golden gaze. "Not while I still have you..."

Cagalli started to reply, but he cut her off with a kiss; a gesture of affection that was too often denied them by their need to maintain their public personas. _But deep down inside,_ Kevin thought to himself contentedly, _we haven't changed, not really. All my life, she's been the one constant, the one part of my world I could always depend on. Even when my memory was fragmented, she was there, indistinct but constant. Now... I'll never let anything separate us again._

Once kept apart by death and amnesia for three years, the pair had been reunited in the midst of war, and now they were together. And for now, as they held each other, that was enough.

* * *

Flay was getting intensely tired -and frustrated- with her continued confinement. Usually it was at least tolerable, as Jack Carter was, whatever his faults might be, an interesting conversationalist, with a knowledge of odd subjects that rivaled the youth he'd been cloned from. But with him, his exec, and the entire crew of the rogue _Nazca_-class destroyer _D'Artangan_ having left on some mysterious errand, the space colony-turned-military-base was a dull place indeed.

She was also beginning to feel very uneasy. Trained instincts were something she'd picked up during her time under Kevin Walker's command, and right now they were jabbing at her sharply... sharply enough that at dinner this particular night, she'd palmed a steak knife and hidden it up her sleeve. She rather thought Carter's chef -whom he'd recruited who-knew-where, and wasn't even a soldier- had seen her do it, but apparently he, too, felt uneasy, which told the young redhead that something was amiss, something that even her erstwhile captors were bothered by.

_Maybe it has something to do with that ship that landed earlier,_ Flay thought, turning the problem over in her mind. It had been an Orb shuttle, with diplomatic markings; its sole occupant was a gray-haired man with a bandaged left arm. He'd seemed familiar somehow, as though she'd heard his description somewhere; and whoever the elder gentleman was, he carried himself with an aristocratic bearing and was apparently known to Carter's group.

Known, and not well-liked. When even the chef and the guards appeared uneasy because of his presence, Flay knew the man was someone to watch. Which was probably why no one had attempted to take the knife from her; as she understood it, Carter had given his people strict orders to keep her safe, no matter what.

_But safe from _what? Flay wondered. _Who _is_ that man? Why does he look familiar?_

Frowning, she turned to the computer terminal in her apartment. Though carefully restricted to avoid outgoing information flow, Carter had permitted her to keep an eye on the news... and a terminal that was linked to the base's own network could be used to _access_ that network, if the user had the skill. Flay did, thanks to some lessons her former captain had given her.

Now, sitting down at the terminal, she used those skills to begin hacking into the base security systems, endeavoring to find out what was going on; one of the security cameras, she hoped, would show her the gray-haired man's location.

Tapping commands in as rapidly as she could without missing anything that crossed the screen, Flay still almost missed it: an image of what appeared to be the base's control room, wherein sat the gray-haired man and three young men who looked about sixteen... and all shared the same face.

She gasped, realizing who and what they were. _They're clones,_ she thought, fear crystalizing in her gut. _Members of Carter's Expendables... but he said none of them were active yet at all! What are they... what are they doing there, with that man?_

Flay hurriedly brought up audio, and several questions began to be answered. _"The time has come, my sons,"_ the gray-haired man told the trio of Kevin Walker-clones. _"With Carter off trying to stop the impending disaster, we have a chance to stage our coup d'etat, and take control of this facility."_

_"And then you can cure us, Baron Onishi?"_ the center clone asked.

_"I keep my promises. With the genetic engineering equipment here, your one-year genetic timer can be removed, I believe, with relative ease."_

_"What about the original?"_ the clone on the left questioned. _"He's still a threat to us. None of our number have access to the technology that makes him so strong, and he alone could kill many of us."_

The gray-haired man laughed quietly. _"You needn't worry about my son, Benedict; he is already dying, thanks to Snake Eater. Through him, you can have your revenge against Carter for creating you as you are... just as I shall avenge Irena's death."_ His voice turned cold. _"Had Blue Cosmos not wanted to kill my son that day, my wife would still be alive. For her death, Kevin must die."_

Trembling, Flay shut off the feed, and slumped in her chair. "Baron Onishi," she whispered. "Kevin's father... he's alive... and he's planning to kill Kevin. If he does..." Her eyes widened as something else occurred to her. "If he takes Kevin's place, he might aim even higher, and if he kills Cagalli...!"

Once, she would've cared little about the Orb noblewoman's fate, but now... Not only was she the sister of Kira Yamato, whom she'd once loved, but she was also the girlfriend of Flay's own former captain, whose teachings might well save her life this day...

Another thought struck her, and Flay sat bolt upright just as footsteps began to approach the door to her apartment. _He must know I'm here,_ she realized, _and if he thinks I might know too much-!_

She moved as quickly and quietly as possible to the wall next to the door, and pressed herself against it, letting the knife drop into her hand. Praying that she remembered the few lessons Kevin had given her properly -and thinking gratefully that, in her boredom, she'd built up her muscle strength over the past two years- she waited for whoever was out in the corridor to enter.

A series of tapping sounds and corresponding beeps indicated an override code was being punched into the door panel, and Flay took a deep breath. _It's now or never..._

The door slid open, and a youth with jade eyes and sandy hair stepped in, holding a pistol in one hand. _Okay,_ the clone thought, _let's get this over with. Where's-_

A hand clamped over his mouth, and the clone's eyes widened in surprise and pain as something jabbed into the side of his neck, then ripped forward, severing his windpipe and carotid artery. With the hand covering his mouth, he couldn't even gurgle in shocked pain; all he could do was struggle weakly against the arms holding him in place. And then everything stopped...

Flay lowered the corpse to the floor, wiped the knife on the clone's green uniform, and then noticed the blood that soaked her own dress. It was then that the full reality of what she'd done hit her, and she drew several deep, shuddering breaths, knees trembling. _Did... did I... really just do that...?_ She'd flawlessly performed the sentry-killing technique Kevin had once taught her, ignoring everything but the objective... and only now did she realize that, for the first time, she'd killed a human being.

She was no stranger to death. She'd been there when Heliopolis was destroyed, and at Artemis when Kevin Walker killed three men in the _Archangel_'s cafeteria; and when her father's ship had been destroyed. The day Rau Le Creuset had captured her, several Earth Forces soldiers had died before her eyes, and months later, she'd been on_ Dominion_'s Bridge, manning Communications, when her captain condemned Muruta Azrael to death, and Natarle Badgiruel had carried out his orders. But this... this was the first time she'd done the deed herself, and it had been in a far messier way than she'd seen even Kevin kill.

Taking the life of a human being for the first time, even that of one clone among many, crossed an inner Rubicon in Flay Allster's mind, and she felt something within herself change. After this day, she would never be the same... and she would be the stronger for it.

She took one more deep breath, straightened, and looked down at the knife. "Kevin was a good teacher," she murmured to herself. "And that clone was pathetic..." Flay nodded sharply to herself. "It's time to get out of here. Kevin has to be warned, and it isn't safe here anymore. Guess Carter was right..." She did indeed have more enemies than she'd realized; more than even the shadowy clone had realized. He had protected her till now, and now it was time for her to protect herself.

But first, she needed to change into something with less blood, and more practicality. Kevin had taken the time to teach her a few other things, and it was time to put them into practice.

* * *

In the _Minerva_'s lounge, Lunamaria sighed, thinking worriedly of the coming crisis. "How could this have happened?" she wondered aloud. "Who could be doing this? Even the Earth Alliance wouldn't; that would just hurt their own territory..."

"I don't know," Rey said quietly. "None of it really makes sense. Dropping the remains of Junius Seven on Earth would just antagonize the Naturals, so I wouldn't think it would be Coordinators doing it; yet it makes even less sense for the Earth Forces to do it."

Shinn sighed. "Well, whatever it is, I guess we're the ones who have to do something about it. I heard the Chairman declined Orb's help; well, we didn't exactly need _theirs."_

Meyrin shook her head. "I think he accepted Baron Onishi's offer to help out, actually, because he was speaking as a single person, not as part of his government."

He snorted. "Who cares? He can fight, sure; but what good does a guy like him do us? I don't trust him at all, and his record..."

"He can be trusted to fight for Orb's Chief Representative," Luna said slowly. "Right now, I think that means he's on our side." She exchanged a troubled glance with her sister; they still didn't know what to think of the Baron's admission that he had, indeed, killed Erica himself. "But... how do we stop it? What _can_ we do to stop it?"

"We'll probably have to break it up into as many pieces as we can," Rey said thoughtfully. "There's no way to correct its orbit by now; all we can do is make sure it doesn't come down in one piece. As it is, the effects on climate and coastal areas..."

"Not to mention direct hits," Yolant put in. "But who knows, maybe this is the best thing that could happen, as far as the PLANTs are concerned."

It could've been meant as a joke; the dry, gallows humor of a soldier who'd been long enough on the battlefield to need to either laugh at the situation or have a breakdown... but it didn't sound like one to Cagalli Yula Athha, as she and her bodyguards passed by the lounge.

Kevin could feel her bristling at his side, and felt himself tense, as well. _Uh oh. That wasn't very smart, kid..._ He reached for Cagalli's shoulder. "Wait, Cagalli," he said quietly. "Don't jump to conclusions..."

She shook him off, storming into the lounge. "How can you say something like that?" she demanded. "How can the deaths of millions of innocents be good, even for the PLANTs? And if it destroys _everything,_ even the colonies will be doomed, can't you see that? Is this how ZAFT _still_ sees things, even after what the last war led to?"

Shinn closed his eyes. _Typical Athha,_ he thought in disgust. _All idealism, no empathy or brains. At least Walker has some _sense_ in his head._ "Have you ever heard of a joke?" he demanded aloud. "He wasn't being serious; or didn't you notice?"

Athrun started to step in, but Kevin gave a tiny shake of his head, and walked in himself. "I don't particularly care if it was a joke or not," he informed the black-haired pilot. "If it was, then it was in very poor taste. Believe me, there are some things you just shouldn't joke about, and that's one of them."

Rey nodded. "He's got a point, both of you," he told his friends. "And you should watch what you say, Shinn, especially to visiting members of a government we don't want to antagonize."

Shinn snorted. "What does it matter? She came up to the PLANTs to complain about our attempts at finding better ways to defend ourselves; we don't need that kind of support. Certainly not from _them."_

Athrun's eyes narrowed, and he stepped into the room himself. _There's something going on here,_ he thought._There has to be more to this than just contempt for Orb's neutrality in the last war... And what did Kevin say to him before? Something about... his family?_

"Why is it you hate Orb so much?" he asked finally. "There'd better be a good reason for your actions, Shinn."

Shinn glared at them. "My family was killed in the war because of Athha's ideals!" he snapped. "They all died because you people didn't stop to think about how many people might _die_ thanks to your pride! You ever think about that? About the price Orb's people would pay for your own stubbornness? _Did you?"_

Kevin's jade eyes were cold as he gazed at the hotheaded pilot. "I don't think you understand anything at all, kid," he said quietly. "I don't think you quite understand what went on back then. To be fair, maybe you couldn't; a lot was going on that was never told to the civilians. But let me tell you something: if we'd given in, the consequences would've been catastrophic, and not just to Orb. The PLANTs -the nation you now serve- would've been attacked by even greater forces, if we'd surrendered Morgenroete and the mass driver to the Earth Alliance. We _had_ to stand our ground, long enough to deny them that, long enough to launch _Archangel_ and _Kusanagi_ into space. It was the only hope for Orb's future... for the world's future." He tilted his head, as something else occurred to him. "You know, it might be a little late to be holding a grudge. Most of the people who were behind the policy you object to are dead -only Cagalli and I are left, really- and the one who killed your parents is almost certainly dead, as well. No one on our side would've targeted the ground at all, save for areas the enemy held, and I don't think there were any civilians left in those places."

"I don't know," Shinn ground out, "and I don't know that I really care! But if the bastard _is_ alive, I'll find him one day! The one fired that blue beam will pay for what he did..." He glared at them one more time, and fixed his crimson gaze on Cagalli. "None of you really know anything!" he told her, and stormed out of the lounge, brushing past the silent Leona as though she weren't even there.

She didn't bother to watch him go; she was far more interested in the way Kevin had stiffened in shock...

The Baron shook it off within moments, though, and turned to Cagalli. "Don't worry about it," he murmured. "What he thinks doesn't matter; he wasn't there. You and I were, and we know the truth. Don't let him make you think otherwise."

Cagalli took a deep breath. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right, Kevin. Thanks."

Kevin's eyes flicked over to Athrun. "Alex, you stick with her, okay? Leona and I will be along in a few minutes."

Athrun looked at him oddly, but nodded. "Okay. See you." _I don't know what you're up to, Kevin, and something tells me I_ _don't_ want_ to know..._

_

* * *

_

The confident way in which Kevin led her down _Minerva_'s passageways to an unoccupied compartment, several minutes later, told Leona that perhaps he'd been up his old tricks with computers... and it also told her that he was up to something. She'd heard he could be devious when the mood struck him, but this was the first time she'd seen it for herself.

"So why are we here, Kevin?" she asked him, crossing her arms. "I assume there's a reason you've led me as far from anywhere as you can get on this ship."

Kevin smiled faintly. "You might say that, yes. You and I need to talk, tovarisch... and what I'm about to tell you goes no further. I don't want even Cagalli to hear about it. Maybe _especially_ not Cagalli."

Leona's eyes narrowed. "That sounds suspiciously like the start of a recruitment speech, mon ami."

He nodded. "You could call it that." Reaching behind his back, he drew out one of the revolvers he'd carried to Armory One... or at least that was what she thought it was at first. But there was something odd about it... "Tell me," he began, "what do you make of this weapon?"

She gazed at it for several moments. "Since you're asking me that question, I'm guessing it isn't what it looks like," she said dryly. "And given that the barrel shares certain features with much larger weapons I'm familiar with, I'd say it's a laser pistol." Her own jade eyes met his. "And since I've never heard of anyone making a laser that small, I'm going to guess that you're about to tell me you've been up to things Lady Cagalli has no knowledge of, am I right?"

Kevin smiled. "I always thought the NGSF was made up of smart people; now I'm sure of it. Yes, Leona, you're correct: this weapon is a prototype, constructed by Project Prometheus Unchained. Made up partly by Morgenroete personnel, it's an R&D and paramilitary force operating out of the former Eurasian Federation military satellite known as Artemis."

"Then you've been operating clandestinely since just after the end of the last war." Leona made it a statement, not a question. "You anticipated the renewal of hostilities between Earth and the PLANTs. But why did you keep it a secret?"

He lifted the laser again. "Come on, comrade, you should know better than that. If I'd told Cagalli, she'd have shut me down in a heartbeat. I love her dearly, but she is definitely more of an idealist than I am. Also, she would've been extremely irritated that I kept certain things around, after I wrote official reports stating they weren't."

_"Dominion_ still exists," she said shrewdly. "And... Sturm Falke, perhaps?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes," Kevin acknowledged. "Much of the unit was destroyed at Second Jachin, by Le Creuset's Providence and the nuclear charge I used to blow up GENESIS, but enough remained for me to begin anew, with nanotechnology. Stormhawk has since been fully repaired and remodeled into its 'Beta' form, codename Nemesis. It took most of the past two years to perfect it, as it happens, because even with the Destroyer research data still tucked in my head, we had a hard time taming the power source I chose. But that's neither here nor there." He met her eyes levelly. "I need you, Leona."

"Why?" she asked warily. "If you've been at this as long as you say, with weapons as powerful as you're implying, I don't see why you'd need _my_ help."

"Because," he answered, "there's not a man or woman under my command, save perhaps John -who prefers to work alone- who can keep up with me. Quite frankly, I need a partner, someone who can stick with me in battle, and with your NGSF gene therapy, you're one of the few people who can keep up. And..." Kevin took a deep breath. "I need you to take care of Cagalli if I don't make it."

Leona blinked, puzzled. "What are you talking about? Not to give you a swelled head, Kevin, but I find it hard to imagine a situation you _couldn't_ get out of."

"There may be one," he said flatly. "I'm dying."

_He's _what? Leona thought. "You're _what?"_ she said aloud. "Of _what?_ Coordinators don't catch deadly diseases, you least of all, and from what I recall of ABADDON's experimentation, you're immune to things like nerve gas. What could possibly...?"

"It's called the Snake Eater virus," Kevin told her. "Or program, that might be a better term. You see, my people and I have been busy analyzing my genetic code for the last two years, and we've recently begun to come up with some interesting data... but we caught this one only after it became active. Something Doctor Hibiki and my bastard of a 'father' inserted into my genome during my genesis: a virus that causes gradual cellular apoptosis, beginning with a slow rate of advance, but speeding up as it moves through the body. In a few months, according to our estimates, it'll attack my heart, and I'll just drop dead. Very neat and tidy. How it became active, I don't know... at least not the specific method."

She tilted her head. "But you know _who,_ don't you," she murmured.

He nodded sharply, anger flickering in his eyes. "I most certainly do. I didn't before, but when Chairman Durandal told me Frank's last words, I knew."

"But," Leona pointed out warily, "all he managed to say before he died was that you needed to know something."

Kevin shook his head. "No. He _did_ get me his message, Leona... because you see, Frank would _never_ call me 'Baron Onishi', except in teasing. In moments of stress -like his own imminent death- he used my name. And that leaves only one thing he could've been trying to tell me."

She nodded slowly, beginning to comprehend the tremendous rage he'd exhibited when the details of his cousin's murder had reached him. "John Tyler Onishi is alive, then. I wonder how... and why he might be trying to kill you."

"I don't know, and frankly, I don't care." His cybernetic hand clenched into a fist. "He will die, no matter what his reasoning might be. For Frank's murder, for leaving my mother to die... and for the things he did to _me,_ both now and when I was created."

"I don't envy him," Leona remarked dryly. "The last time you took a personal interest in someone's fate, he got incinerated. So," she went on, nodding at his hand, "I see you've been up to your old tricks... and what you've been saying hasn't sounded much like the nobleman I met after the war, two years ago. Am I really talking to the Baron... or are you the Snake?"

"Kevin Walker is, and always shall be, a part of me," Kevin told her, a peculiar light in his eyes. "I'm Onishi, and I'm Walker; and quite frankly, I don't think the Baron has what it takes to survive this. He was a fencer, not a soldier, and what I need right now is piloting skill." He lifted his left hand, and touched the angular device beneath the skin of the palm with one metallic finger. "This is proof enough that I can never truly escape the past." He tilted his head. "So. Are you with me, Leona Colde?"

She merely looked at him for several moments, considering. _So _this_ is truly the man they called the Black Asp, eh? Ruthless, cunning, with a preference for heavy firepower and a wit as sharp as his sword. Interesting that he's keeping things from someone he loves so much, but I see his point... both of them._

At last, Leona nodded. "All right... Kevin Walker. I'm with you."

"Good," Kevin said with a nod; and though he didn't so much as relax a muscle -his self-control was formidable enough that his body had shown no sign of tension- he seemed relieved. "Like I said, I need the help." He leaned back against the bulkhead, and brushed his long sandy hair back with a sigh. "For one thing, we've got a battle coming up, and to be perfectly honest, I'm rusty. Not to mention my hair keeps getting in the way; makes me wish I'd kept it short, instead of growing it out again."

Leona thought about that casual complaint for a moment, then reached into her jacket, past the enormous IMI fifty-caliber Desert Eagle, and pulled out a crimson bandanna. "Try this," she suggested, holding it out to him. "It should at least keep your hair out of your eyes when wearing a helmet."

Kevin took it, and gazed at it speculatively for several moments. "Yours?" he said finally. "From when you were in the NGSF?"

She nodded. "That's right. It was a gift... from someone very close to me. I think it would be fitting for you to wear it in turn, since it was you who made the existence of our unit possible."

He nodded slowly, brushed his hair aside again, and wrapped the bandanna around his forehead, keeping the sandy strands in place. "Ex-boyfriend?" he guessed.

"Yes," Leona acknowledged quietly. "He... died at Alaska, with most of the unit."

"I'm sorry."

She shook her head. "It's nothing you need to worry about, mon ami. We've each had our losses, and I daresay you've lost even more than I. We are much alike."

Kevin nodded slowly, absently lighting a cigarette from the pack hidden in his arm. "That's true," he murmured. "But maybe... maybe this time around, we can both put our pasts to rest."

* * *

In a dark room, in a place where gravity held sway, a group of men also met to discuss the coming crisis... but from a different perspective, for they were the leaders of the terrorist group known as Blue Cosmos.

"This is nothing less than a disaster," one member said worriedly. "If that colony hits Earth, the damage to the environment will be severe."

"That was Azrael's mistake," another agreed. "If he was going to smuggle nuclear missiles into the Earth Forces' first direct attack on the PLANTs, he should've made sure there were enough of them to completely destroy their targets, rather than leave a dangerous amount of orbiting debris behind." He looked at their youngest member, who also happened to be the leader. "Something must be done about this."

"Relax," the man known as Lord Djibril said soothingly. "I've already sent Phantom Pain to investigate. They'll find the truth of the matter."

"What about the rumors that Kevin Walker has resurfaced?" another man demanded. "The Crimson Tiger could ruin everything!"

Djibril shrugged. "It's no rumor -Captain Roanoke confirmed Walker's presence at Armory One- but he's only one man, and Phantom Pain's report indicated that he's not as dangerous as he used to be. It seems that during the last two years, he's either lost his touch or simply shut down all his cursed cybernetics. Either way, the Crimson Tiger is no longer the threat he once was."

"And the falling colony itself?"

"As things stand now," he said calmly, "people will be wondering what to do about the situation. _After_ it falls, however, people will be demanding to know who is responsible... and we can easily twist it around to blame the Coordinators. It is, after all, the remains of one of _their_ colonies, falling from orbit. The ignorant populace will listen eagerly to our account of events, how the Coordinators sent Junius Seven to fall from the heavens in an act of genocidal vengeance. That will produce the reaction we desire, I'm sure."

An older member nodded slowly. "You make a good point. The Coordinators build many things in space, including the very colony that threatens to fall on our heads... But what do we do in the meantime, while we wait for Phantom Pain to deal with the situation?"

"We should evacuate from Earth completely," Djibril recommended. "We can wait out the crisis from the moon, and then return to rally the survivors against the Coordinators. When that happens, we can finally wipe them out once and for all."

There was a brief, murmured discussion among the members, and then they nodded in agreement. "Very well, Lord Djibril," the man who'd spoken first said. "We'll do as you suggest, and then meet against after the situation is resolved." He paused. "But... what about Walker himself? He may be weakened, but I doubt the Crimson Tiger has completely abandoned his old ways."

"We could weaken him further," another man suggested. "It's not like the old days; we know how to find him now... and those close to him."

"No," Djibril said immediately. "That would be the _worst_ course of action we could take. I learned from my predecessor's mistake, gentlemen: Walker as he is, is a threat we can deal with. Walker on a mission of vengeance... No, gentlemen. Targeting his friends and family will only spur him to take to his old ways again, and that would be disastrous. We learned that two years ago, when Azrael died."

Silence fell at that, as the others began to understand what he was getting at. Blue Cosmos had tried many times to kill Kevin Walker -first as Kevin Onishi, then Jack Carter, and more recently as Walker- and every attempt had ended in abysmal failure. And when they'd made the battle truly personal for him, he'd killed their leader.

No. It was better to take him unawares, and reasonably relaxed... for otherwise, nothing in the world would stop that man from hunting them.

* * *

Onboard _Minerva,_ final consultations were being made, and the crew was being apprized of the situation. After several planning sessions -which had involved Kevin, as he had, among other things, been active in the Debris Belt for a time after ABADDON- their course of action had been decided upon, and now the ship was moving to rendezvous with a pair of _Nazca_-class destroyers.

Much of the crew had gathered in the hangar, to hear Durandal's briefing on the crisis. All knew something was up, but few knew exactly what. Now they would find out, from the Supreme Council Chairman himself.

"I'm not going to lie to you," he began. "The situation is grave. For reasons not yet determined, the remains of Junius Seven have begun shifting out of their orbit, and appear to be moving toward Earth. At the current rate, the ruins will impact the surface in less than twenty-four hours. It's your job to make sure they do not hit in one piece. To this end, _Minerva_ will be working with the _Voltaire _and_ Rousseau,_ in order to use Meteor Breakers to break up the colony. This ship's mission will largely be as an escort, because we do not know what opposition -if any- will be encountered..."

Alec King floated high up in the hangar, near the Sturm Vogel's head, and slowly shook his own. "Junius Seven," he murmured. "I never dreamed _this_ would happen to it. Bad enough that it was reduced to rubble in the war, but to have _this_ happen, too..."

"That's right, you were born there, weren't you?"

The former ABADDON soldier stiffened for an instant, then relaxed, realizing who had come up behind him. _Getting lax, Alec,_ he told himself. _You deserved that one._ "Yeah," he said aloud. "Yeah, Kevin, Rachel and I were both born there. To see our birthplace going down this way..."

"I know," Kevin said quietly. "You may not believe it, but I've been through something similar myself. Now, I'm not exactly loyal to Orb -no _country_ can claim my loyalty- but even I felt something when my homeland vanished in a ball of flame behind us."

"At least there was still something left to rebuild," Alec said sharply, and then sighed. "But I guess you have a point." He shook himself. "Well, I guess it's our job to stop all this, huh?" He motioned toward the silent machine behind them. "We've finished repairs to the Sturm Vogel... and I tweaked the design a little."

His former commander's eyes narrowed. "What exactly did you do?"

Alec smiled thinly. "You and I both know your body is capable of sustaining far more violent maneuvers than the pilot this machine was intended for," he said softly. "Whether you choose to activate your augmentation or not, the fact is that some of the changes were fundamental alterations of your physical structure. Combine that with whatever crazy genetic engineering produced you, and you're one durable guy. Your G tolerance is probably the highest of anyone aboard, myself included... and unlike anyone else, you've flown the machine this was based on."

Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Meaning that I can potentially use this machine to great effect, in other words. You've released some of the safety systems, then?"

Basilisk nodded. "The governors on the maneuvering programming were... overly cautious, shall we say, especially considering your own capabilities. I've trimmed back the safety protocols... and in the process, I found the original blueprints for the design within the Sturm Vogel's database."

The Baron looked at him shrewdly. "Original blueprints?"

Alec half-smiled. "I don't know if the Chairman mentioned it -he might not even have known; this was actually built near the end of the last war, before he came to power- but this unit was never actually completed. Most of the systems were installed, but when it was discovered that no pilot could be found who could take full advantage of its capabilities, construction was aborted. It was originally intended to be transformable, just like your original, and the rifles are, in reality, a scaled-down twin buster rifle like your own. The reason they can't be operated at full power is because they were designed with a nuclear-powered machine in mind; the Sturm Vogel was originally equipped with a nuclear reactor, but it was replaced with a standard rechargeable energy battery -like that of the newer prototypes- when the Junius Treaty was signed. Since the development program was shut down almost immediately thereafter, the rifles were never modified to compensate."

Kevin tilted his head. "And this means...?"

"This means that, in theory, this unit is a near-direct copy of your old machine... and you _can,_ in fact, get off a full-powered shot if you have to. Just one, and it'll leave you with emergency power only, but if you need to destroy something instantly, you can." Alec gazed at him levelly. "I just thought you might want to know that... Commander."

The soldier once known as Hydra slowly nodded. "Thank you, Alec. I'll be sure to keep that in mind..."

* * *

"Kevin's right, you know," Athrun remarked to Cagalli, handing her a drink in the quarters set aside for them. "You shouldn't let what Shinn said bother you. He may've lost his family, but you didn't exactly get out of that without some losses of your own, you know."

Cagalli sighed. "I know, but... that still doesn't make it any easier. The battles back then... so many people died..." She thought back to that horrible, final day in Orb, before she'd been launched into space to escape the conflagration. Her last sight of her father, mere moments after learning that Kira Yamato was, in fact, her twin brother... "My father suffered from his decisions, too," she murmured. "Shinn doesn't seem to understand that _we _lost everything, too..."

"Just like I lost my mother at Junius Seven," he agreed. "Shinn's too consumed by his own emotions to think that maybe things aren't what they look like to him. I was the same way, once," he admitted. "Too blinded by a need for revenge to wonder if Kira really _did_ have a reason for fighting alongside the _Archangel..."_

"Don't blame yourself," Leona advised, entering and parking herself in a chair. "You're hardly the only one to have ever sought vengeance, Alex; I did the same, long ago."

Athrun looked at her in surprise. "Vengeance? You? I find it hard to believe someone like you could be so controlled by your emotions, Leona."

She snorted. "Don't let my self-control fool you, mon ami; it came only with a great deal of experience, and quite a few things I did which I'd rather not remember. Suffice it to say that, after Blue Cosmos murdered my parents, I joined ZAFT and became a dog of the military for my own purposes. I sold my body and my soul, to take my revenge upon the world. I did things that no person should ever do..." She sipped at a drink of her own, staring pensively into the cabin's dimness. "Kevin won't talk about what he did during his time on the run from the world... but I think I know what it was. And I also think that nothing he did can compare to what _I_ did in the name of vengeance. People change, mon ami, and you and I have changed for the better, I think."

He gazed at her speculatively for a moment, wondering what this self-contained woman, with reflexes and lethality that approached Kevin's, could possibly have done in her past to merit such a melancholy soliloquy. _I guess every soldier does things they regret,_ he thought to himself. _Kevin was certainly right about that. But... what shared pain do they have? What _did_ Kevin do in those years... and what is it _she_ did that could be worse?_

Athrun didn't expect to get answers to those questions. Leona Colde and Kevin Onishi were almost frighteningly similar, both in terms of skill on the battlefield and their shared tendency to be closemouthed about their own dark pasts. Certainly the pair of them got along extremely well; they were two of a kind, linked by shared pain, shared skills... and even, to a certain extent, shared genes. Athrun had heard rumors to the effect that Leona's eyes had originally been a more ordinary color than the bright jade they were now...

Leona, for her part, stared moodily at her drink. _Four years it's been now,_ she thought to herself. _Four years since they modified us with his genes. Since we became ZAFT's wet-work unit, replacing the failed ABADDON and Serpent Head. Two and a half since most of my comrades were wiped out by Le Creuset's Alaskan treachery... two since I saw Zala's madness first hand, and joined those who were still sane._ She glared at the mildly-alcoholic drink; because of the scientists adding Kevin's genes to her own, she couldn't even forget her sorrows in drink. Like the original Hydra, her liver was too efficient for that.

Athrun flicked his gaze over to her briefly, still wondering about her past, and the peculiar rapport between ex-Next Generation Special Forces soldier and ex-ABADDON super-soldier. _Could it be...? Well, not on Kevin's side. He's been with Cagalli in one way or another all their lives, and nobody who's seen them in private would doubt their feelings for each other. But is _she...? The more he thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. Kevin had always an almost mystical way of inspiring trust and friendship in those he met, despite his fearsome reputation and occasionally cold demeanor. He formed fast -and lasting- friendships with men and women alike with ease, yet Athrun had noticed there was occasional something more on the part of some of them. Kevin had openly admitted Rachel Carver had been involved with him, and some of the things he'd heard both from Kevin and the Hawke sisters hinted that Erica "Scylla" Hawke had, at one point, had at least some feelings for her commander. Then there was Meryl Steiglitz, _Dominion_'s helmswoman, who lived in the massive Onishi mansion herself, and had always looked at her captain in a peculiar way...

He shook himself. It was entirely possible that Leona had feelings -maybe even strong ones- for Kevin, but it was something she'd never admit to anyone, _especially_ Kevin himself, and it wasn't really important anyway.

The cabin hatch slid open, and Kevin himself stepped in, looking pleased with himself; and before he could say a word, Cagalli let go of her drink and practically threw herself into his arms, surprising the Baron.

"Guess everybody's feeling melancholy right now," he remarked, returning the embrace. "The colony drop, right? I guess I'm not surprised it brought back some bad memories."

"Yeah," Cagalli said into his shoulder. "That, and... what Shinn said earlier, in the lounge. It just... reminded me of the Battle of Orb, two years ago, remember."

Kevin nodded. "Oh, yeah, I know."

"All this reminds _me_ of the Bloody Valentine," Athrun put in quietly. "Something I didn't really want to be reminded of, you know?"

"I know that, too. If I'd been a couple hours slower in leaving, I'd have died there to, remember?" Even after joining Kira at Heliopolis, Kevin had had a penchant for visiting battlefields during his off time... though he hadn't exactly expected that to _be_ a battlefield...

Leona glanced over at him. "Speaking of what Shinn said earlier... it seemed to bother you somehow, Kevin. What exactly did he say?"

Kevin stiffened for an instant, and closed his eyes. "I guess you wouldn't know, would you," he murmured. "You didn't defect until long after the Battle of Orb... Well, you know how he said his family was killed by a blue energy blast from the sky?"

She nodded, not noticing how Athrun, too, stiffened. "Yes, he said something about that. I take it you know who did it? I guess I shouldn't be surprised, since not many machines used weapons like that."

"That's an understatement," he told her. "Only one weapon in that entire conflict fired azure energy bolts: the twin buster rifle used by MBF-M1000 Sturm Falke."

Cagalli inhaled sharply. "Wait a minute, Kevin. You're saying..."

Kevin nodded unhappily. "Only one machine could've done it, Cagalli. And when I have the chance, I intend to go over the visual records of that battle, because I do _not_ remember misfiring that badly. You know I'm only an average pilot when using mass-produced machines, but with something tailored specifically to me, I _don't_ make mistakes of that magnitude."

"Then you're saying he's lying?" Leona questioned.

He shook his head. "Not possible. For one thing, I would've sensed it; and for another, he clearly has no idea which machine could've fired the shot, yet knows _we_ probably do, which means he knows we could check it. Besides... he doesn't strike me as a liar. Crazy, yeah, but not a liar." His shoulders twitched. "On a lighter note, we'll be working with some old friends in this operation. I heard the Chairman announce that we're on our way to rendezvous with _Voltaire _and_ Rousseau."_

Athrun smiled at that news. "Those are Yzak's ships, aren't they? It'll be good to seem him and Dearka again. I haven't seen them much since the war."

"Neither have I," Kevin agreed. "Dearka was a good friend of mine before the end," he explained for Leona's benefit, "and Yzak served on _Dominion_ in the last month of the war. He's a bit of a hothead, but believe me, he's easier to get along with than Shinn."

Cagalli smiled, too. "And it never hurts to have them helping us." She had personal reasons for having a high opinion of Yzak Joule's skill: he'd saved her life at Jachin Due, just before GAT-X252 Forbidden, piloted by Shani Andras, had been destroyed.

Maybe things were beginning to look up...

* * *

Almost too soon, the word came that they were nearing their objective. _"All hands to Battlestations!"_ rang out over the _Minerva_'s PA system. _"Repeat, all hands to Battlestations! Baron Onishi, Commander Colde, please report to the hangar immediately!"_

Kevin gave Cagalli's shoulder a last, reassuring squeeze, then charged out into the corridor, Leona barely a pace behind him. "I wonder what they want _me_ for?" the woman wondered as they hurried down the passage. "And why call me 'Commander'? I haven't been called that since I left ZAFT at Jachin."

Kevin shrugged. "I have no idea about the first, and as for calling you Commander, I suspect they simply don't know what _else_ to call you. You don't have a handy title of nobility the way I do." He grunted. "Wish _I_ didn't have the title, either, but that's neither here nor there..."

"Quite," Leona said dryly. "By the way, any chance of some... extra assistance in this mission? Given what you said you've been up to..."

He shook his head. "Hard to say. _Dominion_ can't possibly be ready -I don't even know where my exec _is,_ and she's the only other person I'd trust in command- and while Nemesis _could_ likely get here in time from Earth, there's the small problem that it uses a new kind of powerplant, which needs time to become fully operational, at least for first activation. However, I do have Max on her way with another new unit, codename Morgan, with a more conventional nuclear reactor."

She chuckled. "You know, you don't seem to have much respect for the Junius Treaty at all."

Kevin grinned rakishly. "Why should I? _I_ never signed it, and all my units have been built at Artemis, well outside the jurisdiction of any nation."

They drifted into the hangar itself within moments, to be met by Alec King and Mad Abes. "The Captain says you'll be helping out," Abes said without preamble to Kevin. "Well, as I think Kyle told you earlier, we've got the Sturm Vogel repaired again, so you're ready to go." He shook his head. "Y'know, for an ace pilot, Baron, you sure get shot up a lot."

"Don't let my reputation fool you, Mister Abes," Kevin told him with a wry smile. "Without a machine customized to my specs, I'm an average pilot at best. I'd probably have been shot down last time if I didn't have fast reflexes." His tone turned serious. "You got any idea what's happening out there?"

Abes shrugged. "All I know is that we've arrived, and the Joule team seems to have things under control so far, but..." He shrugged again, and turned to Leona. "Anyway. Commander Colde, apparently they're requesting your assistance as well, as a former member of the NGSF. We've got a mobile suit ready for you, if you agree." He jerked his head toward one of the ZAKUs.

Leona looked at it for several moments, and then blinked. Steel gray, with a shield-like emblem on the chest armor. On the shield was the image of a woman's helmeted head, reminiscent of a Valkyrie, with the words "Ghosts of Razgriz" written above it. "This is..."

Kevin glanced at her. "I don't recognize those colors _or_ the emblem," he said quizzically. "You do, I take it?"

She nodded slowly. "I do indeed. Razgriz... that was what we called ourselves, in the NGSF; it came from a book I had when I was a girl, called 'A Blue Dove for the Princess'. That was our emblem, except the old one said 'Demons of Razgriz', not Ghosts. But it makes sense, since most of us died at Alaska..."

Abes cleared his throat. "I wondered about that. Anyway, it's mostly a stock ZAKU Warrior in custom colors, but we've also modified one of the Force Silhouette's spare beam sabers for use with it. Add in a Wizard pack's firepower..."

"I don't need a Wizard pack," Leona told him, still looking at the mobile suit. "A beam rifle and saber will be enough for me." She glanced at the mechanic. "I was flying in the old days, before we _had_ multiple weapon loadouts like the Wizard packs; back then, we were lucky to have an assault rifle and GINN sword. No, this will do fine, thank you."

Abes shrugged. "Whatever you say, Commander."

"You'd better get moving," Alec put in quietly. "I think the operation has already started. There's no more time to wait around."

Kevin nodded. "You're right. Come on, partner, let's go. We've got places to be, things to do..."

"People to blow up," Leona finished. "Right. Let's suit up and get out there."

In her quarters, Cagalli watched a computer monitor worriedly. It showed her a view of the hangar, where two of her bodyguards -one of them the man she loved- were preparing to launch. "Please, Kevin," she whispered. "Please... come back safe."

"Don't worry too much about him," Athrun said gently from behind her. "C'mon, when has Kevin ever let you down? Hey, when Yzak and the rest of us were chasing the _Archangel_ two years ago, we never managed to even scratch him until the day you got to Orb, and even then he only went down because his machine was jury-rigged. What he's flying now isn't, and he's got Leona with him, and _she's_ no slouch, either."

"Yeah. Leona." Cagalli felt a twinge of something at the thought. She wasn't sure what, unless... jealousy?

Athrun saw her hesitation, and chuckled, correctly guessing what it was. "Don't worry about _that,_ Cagalli. Kevin's been devoted to you all his life... and have you forgotten Leona has some of Kevin's genes? I don't know about her, but I know Kevin would think of that as inbreeding, even if it occurred to him to think about her that way at all, which he wouldn't."

She sighed. "I guess you're right. But still... I know how Kevin still feels about Rachel Carver's death, Alex. He still misses her, you know, and sometimes I feel like I'm competing with her ghost."

He snorted. "Cagalli, not only is Carver dead, but so is the Kevin who loved her. I know how he feels now, but a lot of that is just guilt at what he did to her, and the rest is just him mourning one of the best friends he ever had. Look," he went on, "I know him just about as well as you do, and I'd know if he wasn't completely devoted to you."

Cagalli nodded slowly. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right. I guess... I'm just worried about him, and that's making me worried about other things."

"He'll come back alive, Cagalli," Athrun assured her. "He always does, even if he has to die before he manages it. Besides, the _only_ times he's ever let himself die in battle were when that was the only way to get the job done, and since I can't think of how self-destructing the Sturm Vogel would help..."

Her nod was firmer this time. "You _are_ right, Alex. Thanks." _But I'm still going to worry,_ she thought, watching the two mobile suits seal their hatches. _Because I love you, Kevin..._

Behind her, Athrun turned to leave. "I've got to go," he said over his shoulder. "But I'll be back, too."

Cagalli turned to face him, confused. "Where are you going?"

"I'm going to ask Captain Gladys to lend me a mobile suit," he replied. "Kevin stands to lose more than I ever could by doing this; I'm not about to let my friend go out there alone. Besides," he added with a brief grin, "this'll make _sure_ he comes back in one piece, right?"

Her answering smile was tentative but real. "Right."

* * *

On the Bridge, Gladys watched closely as the mobile suits from the Joule team began deploying the meteor breakers to break up the colony's remains. So far, there'd been no sign of whatever had caused the colony to begin its bizarre movement, and that only made this situation the more worrisome...

Fortunately, _Minerva_'s own complement of mobile suits was beginning to launch now, and she felt rather better with Kevin Onishi and Leona Colde heading out. Not only was the Baron's machine tougher -and better armed- than a ZAKU, but Colde was a veteran pilot who had survived some things even tougher than her compatriot had, at least in terms of mobile suit combat. She'd been one of the last members of the Next-Generation Special Forces to leave ZAFT, and it actually surprised Gladys that she'd wound up as a simple bodyguard, instead of some elite Orb pilot.

"The operation is proceeding smoothly so far," Arthur Trine murmured. "No sign of opposition as of yet."

She nodded. "Good. Proceed as planned." _If things can go smoothly for just a little longer, maybe this won't be a disaster after all..._

She glanced up, however, when the Bridge hatch slid open, admitted "Alex Dino". "May I speak with you a moment, Captain?" he said formally.

Gladys nodded. "Of course. Has something important come up?"

Athrun took a deep breath. "I think you said earlier that you don't have enough pilots for the machines you have. In that case... I'd like to volunteer to fly one of them in this operation."

She stared at him for several moments. That could not be an easy request for him to make, under the circumstances; arrangements had been made, both by Chairman Eileen Canaver and through Baron Onishi's personal intervention, but there yet remained elements who would not look kindly upon the son of Patrick Zala, should he show his face again.

"Are you sure about that?" she asked finally. "You know what that would mean. Are you really willing to let Chairman Canaver's efforts on your behalf go to waste?"

Athrun met her gaze levelly, and pointed at the display. "That man," he began, "is a very good friend of mine. We've known each other most of our lives, and I know better than you do how much _he_ stands to lose if his identity comes out. The knowledge of his continued existence could well be enough to precipitate a war... yet he's willing to go out there, because someone important to him is on this ship, and her nation is threatened by this event just as much as the rest of the world. If Kevin Walker can risk that much, then so can I."

Durandal turned from behind Gladys' chair, and nodded slowly to himself. _A man of courage... and it's interesting how he speaks of the Baron. In times of stress, he forgets the "Onishi" entirely... which means that, perhaps, the Hydra is not truly gone after all..._

"It's not a bad idea," he said aloud. When Gladys turned to look at him, he explained, "We're not going into a battle here, Captain, but we _do_ need all the support we can get. That's why I suggested sending out Commander Colde, and why I accepted Baron Onishi's offer of assistance." Durandal turned to Athrun. "We'll have one of the spare ZAKUs prepared for you, Alex. Head out when ready."

Athrun nodded, and turned to leave... and as he did so, Burt Heim sat bolt upright in his chair. "Multiple heat sources, Captain!" he called. "GINN High Maneuver Mark IIs, according to the catalogue; they're opening fire on our units!"

Gladys spun to face the display, and her eyes narrowed as she saw the enemy -flying ZAFT-made machines- begin to tear into ZAFT's forces. "Alex, you'd better get to the hangar as quickly as possible," she told him. "Crew, prepare for battle."

* * *

Yzak Joule cursed, and snapped off a shot from his blue ZAKU Phantom's beam rifle toward the GINN High Maneuver that had just attempted to cut him in half. "Who _are_ these bastards, anyway?" he grumbled, watching his target rip itself apart. "Where'd they get those machines, and why are they trying to _do_ something like this?"

"I don't know," Dearka Elsman said in reply, ducking beneath an emerald dart aimed for his own Gunner ZAKU Warrior. He brought his own cannon up, and triggered a red-orange blast that scorched across space, stabbed into the enemy unit's torso, and blew it apart in a torrent of shrapnel. "All I know is that it's up to _us_ to stop it."

"Yeah," his commander agreed sourly. "Now where are those machines from the _Minerva?_ We could use a little help here!"

It just wasn't right, Yzak reflected. Things had started out peacefully enough, with his people from _Voltaire_ and_ Rousseau_ locating the proper positions and placing the meteor breakers without much difficulty... but then those High Maneuver GINNs had turned up out of nowhere and blown two of his GuAIZ Rs apart. In a matter of minutes, the whole situation had become a total furball, with some mobile suits continuing to place meteor breakers while the others fought hard to keep the enemy at bay...

Another GINN rocketed toward Yzak, one hand at the hilt of its powerful sword, and he prepared to fire on it, as well... until it suddenly exploded, as a powerful emerald bolt, larger than that from a ZAKU's rifle, tore into it from behind, smashing through the GINN's wings and the back of its torso, before ripping out the cockpit hatch and causing the entire mobile suit to vanish in a tremendous ball of flame. "Amateurs," a familiar voice sneered. "Always watch your back."

Yzak smiled, seeing the winged blue-and-white mobile suit fly through the debris. "Captain Walker," he called, "I never thought I'd say this, but I'm glad to see you."

"Likewise, Yzak," Kevin greeted, lifting his combined rifle and scanning for more targets. "Can't say this situation is exactly ideal -I _really_ miss Stormhawk right now- but it could be worse. And I brought some more help, too."

"Would it be too much to hope for it to be the Nemesis?" Dearka asked; like Yzak, he was one of the few briefed on the existence of the prototype unit.

"'Fraid not, but I did bring Leona Colde with me. She's good, Dearka, very good. In fact, she's-"

He broke off, raising his shield to ward off an emerald dart, and returned fire. He missed... but a steel-gray ZAKU came down from above, a flaming beam saber in hand, and slashed down through the GINN's head, down to between its legs. "She stoops to conquer!" Leona crowed, raising her voice for practically the first time in Kevin's memory as her target drifted apart in two halves, before exploding. "The last remaining Ghost of the Razgriz hasn't lost her touch after all."

Yzak nodded approvingly. "So you're the one, eh? The survivor of both Alaska and Jachin."

"That's me," Leona agreed. "Last of the Next-Generation Special Forces, as far as I know, and currently a bodyguard for Orb's Chief Representative. A good living, but it _does_ feel good to be back in the cockpit, fighting against these... well, whoever they are."

On the communications screens, she and Kevin exchanged grins, and turned back to the battle... just as a voice spoke over the radio. "Oh, you're not _quite_ the last member of NGSF remaining, Leona," the voice said in grim amusement. "A few of us are still here... just as a few of ABADDON's staff still live. Isn't that right... Hydra?"

Yzak and Dearka exchanged confused looks, but Leona and Kevin took on identical frozen-jade looks in their eyes, and they spoke as one. _"Sato!"_

_

* * *

_

Author's note: Junius Seven has begun its fall; and as it hurtles toward Earth, Kevin Onishi must come to terms with his past, and the divisions within his own mind, even as he faces off against someone from his past... and Leona's...

Now all that remains to be seen is whether _Minerva_ and her crew can stop the colony's fall before it destroys everything the Four Ships Alliance once fought for...

Hm; not sure if this update is faster or slower than the last, but if it is slower, at least I have some excuse: this was even _longer_ than the last chapter, with several new elements introduced. The game is afoot, comrades, and things will only get more Byzantine from here on. In the meantime, let me know what you think. -Solid Shark


	6. Chapter 6: Shattered Skies

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, and Frank Castile

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"During the war, I used to look back on the past, trying to remember how it was I used to be. Once upon a time, I was a carefree kid, just enjoying life; not even the knowledge of my zoanthrope powers bothered me. Why should it? The tiger had always lain within me; I never knew what life without it might be._

_"Yes, I was once just a kid, living some of the time with my best friends in Copernicus, the rest with the girl I would later grow to love. But as I looked back on those days, it was like some of Oracle's memory conditioning still remained. I couldn't remember what it was like to be an innocent youth, one untainted by the knowledge of warfare, by the cybernetic and genetic experiments that would later dominate me, by the insanity of what my father tried to do..._

_"By the knowledge of blood on my own hands._

_"I'd wonder, standing on the cliff outside my mansion, or in the _Archangel_'s observation deck... what had changed? Why couldn't I remember? All I'd known for so long was the stench of blood and sweat and death... the gunfire, sirens, and screams of the field of battle. From the age of thirteen my hands became weapons of war, instruments of death, the tools with which I killed my enemies, my friends, and the girl I -as Hydra- had loved._

_"But the time came when I began to realize that it didn't matter. Whatever had become of the innocent child, I had to come to grips with my body and my mind being a single, forged lethal weapon. I played the role of the aristocrat, yet my soul had been tempered by the fires of war, and things even worse than that. War is hell, and that had been the furnace that forged my very being; and with the soldier and the politician warring in my mind, I knew I would be destroyed if I still attempted to be both._

_"So it was on the day of Break the World, the day that shattered the skies, that I began to accept what I was, and am. I am a warrior. I am a lethal weapon._

_"I am the Angel of Death..."_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

"_PLEASE, I don't know anything!" the man shouted as his captor continued her torture on him. It had been more than a couple of hours since he was abducted as he walked home from his office, a daily ritual he made after he and his family moved to Orb, when a non-descript black car pulled up next to him as he walked down a side street he always took as a shortcut home._

_He was surprised when one of the tinted windows rolled down and a huge Israeli-made Desert Eagle automatic was pointed straight at him, and he froze, caught between staying still or trying to make a run for it. Then a garbled voice told him to casually enter the car or his family would be killed. He had no choice but to comply, and he was knocked out the moment he entered the car. He woke up chained to a wall, completely naked from the waist up, in what looked like an abandoned warehouse._

_There was only a single swaying bulb that provided illumination to the otherwise pitch black surroundings when he started looking around, and that was when he noticed an unknown female with sandy hair and jade green eyes. The woman wore black military boots, jungle camouflage pants, and a dark green muscle shirt, with a folder in hand. When he demanded to know what she wanted, his captor walked up to him and slugged him in his stomach, causing him to vomit some blood._

_Then she outlined his personal history, and what surprised him was that it also listed that he was a deep undercover spy for Blue Cosmos. Her demands were simple, the location of his own personal files and info on other Blue Cosmos members. His training kicking in, the man readied himself for the forthcoming pain. _

_That's where he was right now, his body bearing many cuts, burns, welts, bruises, and he could feel that a couple of his ribs were probably broken. One of his eyes was shut, his lip split, and he had some teeth knocked out. He was already nearing his breaking point when his captor stopped her ministrations on him and gave a small grin,_

"_I am impressed, Mr. Penber, with you holding out for so long. They trained you quite well, but now let's see how far your training will last."_

_Then she whistled, and to his horror, out of the darkness came his wife and son stumbling and falling down at his feet, both bound and gagged._

"_No...not them…" begged Penber, as he watched the woman haul his son to his feet and push him down on a chair she had brought in, then tied him to it._

"_Now I ask again, where are the files?" the woman asked him again, and when he said that 'he didn't know' his captor grabbed one of his sons fingers and did a sharp twist, breaking it._

_His son's screams of pain were muffled a bit by his gag, but the agony present in his eyes was torture enough. Again, the woman asked and every time he denied being a spy or knowing any info or begging his captor to stop, she would calmly and deliberately break one of his son's fingers, then she kept going until all of his fingers on his hands and feet were broken. Before she stopped, Penber's son was just staring at the floor with dull eyes still shedding tears. _

_Then, just when Penber thought that his captor had reached the limits of her stone cold brutality, she proved him wrong and this time it was his wife that paid the price. She whistled again and this time, three figures emerged and stepped into the light, his captor made a gesture at them and then at his wife. The three looked at each other for a moment and moved towards his wife, when Penber realized too late what their intentions were._

_The men had just started when Penber lost it, and started spilling forth every little secret that he knew about Blue Cosmos and anything that would make the men raping his wife stop, but the woman made no move or signal for her men to stop and was just content to calmly record all the information that came from his mouth and in the end, Penber was made to watch and listen as he was broken anew._

_When they were finally done with his wife, the three men left her lying on the cold floor. Penber wasn't able to look at the shell of his wife, whose lifeless eyes now mirrored that of her sons', both having lost their grip on sanity and were destroyed, both physically and mentally. _

"_Please, they've had enough…please…" Penber cried as his tears continued to fall from his eyes, but his captor ignored him completely as she pulled out a small cellphone from her back pocket and called someone. A few moments later, she was chatting with another person on the line, whom she told that the mission was complete, and that he'd given them everything they needed. Then he heard her say,_ "_I'll take care of the prisoners," and turned off her cell, then shot him once in each leg, eliciting a cry of pain from him as she unshackled him from his chains and threw him down to the floor near where his wife lay, oblivious to everything around her. _

_The woman watched with a detached look on her face as she watched the man crawled slowly and painstakingly towards his wife, leaving a trail of blood. Wanting Penber to suffer more before he died a slow death, she drew her Desert Eagle, blew the brains out of his son, and then finished off his wife, showering the man with her brain matter._

_Ignoring the scream of anguish that erupted from the man's mouth at the death of his wife and son, she grabbed a gas can and liberally spread it around the area. Then she heard the broken man's question._

"_Why?" _

_The woman looked at Penber calmly and said, "Think back more than ten years ago, a park in France, where you and your 'friends' killed more than a dozen people." Seeing his eyes widen slowly in remembrance, she continued,"You killed my family, and now I killed yours." _

_Lighting a match, the woman threw it to the ground and watched as the spilled gas ignited and engulfed Penber and his fallen family. _

_Walking out of the warehouse, the woman felt the cool sea breeze caressing her face, and walked towards a nearby jet-ski, before turning around and gazing back at the warehouse where she could still hear his cries of pain amidst the growing roar of the fire. She turned away and climbed on the jet-ski before starting it._

"_You go to hell first," the green eyed, sandy haired woman said as she revved away from the pier, as the warehouse suddenly erupted into a great ball of fire when the flames reached the stores gas barrels inside. "I'll meet you there someday."_

* * *

"We're entering the Debris Belt now, Sir," Jonathon Sarnac reported on the Bridge of the _Nazca_-class destroyer _D'Artangan._ "There's something strange about the debris field itself, though..."

Jack Carter leaned forward in his chair. "Strange, how? I don't think I really want things to be strange right now, Jonathon; we're already planning on going into a war zone as it is, and I don't want us smashed to bits by rogue wreckage before we even get to Armory One."

"I don't think it's anything like that, Sir," Sarnac murmured, checking instruments. "There's a weirdly clear path in the Belt, and... weapons fire nearby...?" He stiffened abruptly, face going white. "Oh, no..."

"What is it?" Carter demanded. "What do you see out there, Jonathon?"

His exec turned to look him in the eye. "It's Junius Seven, Captain," he said, sounding dazed. "It's not where it used to be; that's what cleared a path out this way. And that weapons fire... it appears to be three or four ZAFT ships, including the _Minerva,_ as well as numerous mobile suits; some appear to be trying to place meteor breakers on the colony wreckage itself, while others are trying to shoot the first group. It's a real melee out there, Sir. Also, there seems to be an unidentified vessel nearby, probably Earth Forces."

The clone closed his eyes. _This is bad,_ he thought, almost detached. _We head out here to lend a hand at Armory One to keep the balance of power from shifting to the Earth Alliance, and now we stumble into what looks like an attempt to crack the planet open._

The jade eyes opened. "Which side is _Minerva _on, Jonathon?"

"They're with the group trying to stop the apparent colony drop, Captain," Sarnac said promptly. "So is the Sturm Vogel, which appears to be assisting what I think is the Joule team."

"He would," Carter murmured. "Joule and Elsman both served with Walker, and Joule was even under his direct command... All right, Jonathon," he said, coming to his feet, "let's get moving. Have the hangar prep Justice for launch; I'm going out there personally."

Sarnac nodded, but he was clearly troubled. "Understood, Sir. I'll pass it on."

The clone half-smiled sympathetically. "I'm sorry, Jonathon," he said quietly. "I know what happened to your sister at Jachin, and I'm sure helping ZAFT -and Walker- doesn't sit well with you. But right now, even _I_ have to put aside my differences with Walker, because this is a lot bigger than just killing him. Oh, sure, I want to do that, become the _only_ Kevin Walker, but I'd also kind of like to enjoy life afterwards... and that would be kind of hard to do if the whole planet is destroyed by a falling colony. It's time to side with the lesser of two evils, my friend."

His exec nodded again. "I know, Sir. Good hunting."

"Same to you. Try to keep _D'Artangan_ out of it, but if you see an opening, take it."

* * *

Yzak blinked at the raw hatred he heard in the voice of his own former captain and the unnatural calm rage from the woman who seemed to be his sidekick. "Sato?" he repeated. "You know this guy, Captain?"

"Too well," Kevin seethed, eyes frozen jade as he stared at the GINN High Maneuver that had made the critical transmission. "He was a member of the ABADDON support unit, five years ago; he was also one nasty bastard, as I remember it."

"And after that," Leona chimed in, her own eyes sharing the frozen look, "he was the first person to be modified by the so-called 'Hydra genes', and became the leader of _my_ unit. I thought he was dead, the son of a..."

"Unfortunately for you, Leona," Sato called, "I'm not dead... but soon you will be. You'll die here, in the same place my daughter was murdered three years ago. You'll join Elizabeth in the grave, just like all those worthless Naturals on Earth, the ones who killed her..."

"Is that what this is about, Sato?" Leona demanded. "Revenge? You've become nothing more than a dog; you've sold your body and your soul for the sake of vengeance. You think this will bring your daughter back? You think this will bring back any of the people you've lost since that war began?"

"You're one to talk, Leona," Sato said contemptuously. "Or have you forgotten why people called you 'The Fury'?"

She flinched inwardly. "That was a long time ago," she said in a low, dangerous voice. "And unlike you, I've learned my lesson." _Yes, I learned my lesson... I just wish it hadn't cost so many innocent lives before I did._ The thought of what might have happened had she and Kevin -with their mutual grievance- met during the time after she first joined ZAFT scarcely bore thinking on.

"Maybe you _have_ changed, Leona," Sato told her, voice dripping contempt, "but some of us still remember the cause we were loyal to. Or did you really think you and I were the last of the Razgriz?"

Leona glared. "So more survivors are out here? You'll pay for this, Sato, all of you. Your 'ideals' weren't the same ones I was always told we were about. It was supposed to be about freedom, not retaliatory oppression!" Her borrowed beam saber snapped up to guard position. "I'm going to finish what Alaska and Jachin Due started, Sato, right here, right now."

The Sturm Vogel darted in front of her just as she began to move. "No, Leona," Kevin said quietly. "You can have the others... but Sato is _mine._ I have the prior claim; I vowed long ago to wipe out all those relics of ABADDON, pay them back for everything they did to me..."

She hesitated for a moment, then nodded. "All right, he's yours. Do what you have to do, mon ami."

Yzak winced inside his ZAKU Phantom. "Dearka," he muttered, "who had the bright idea to introduce those two? They're bad enough on their own, but put them together and they start sounding like they're gangsters out to 'grease' people."

Dearka shrugged. "Kevin would say it's Fate, I guess; and maybe it is, who knows." He smiled. "Anyway, I'm glad to see them," he added, triggering a blast from his beam cannon.

"Yeah," his commander said grudgingly, "so am I. But I can't help remembering that Captain Walker always used to get shot down when he wasn't flying his own custom machines..."

Ahead of them, Kevin did not care in the slightest what had happened to him in past dogfights; he was focused solely on his objective, as he poured energy into his thrusters. "Let's do this," he whispered. "For the ghosts of the past... for Rachel, and the others I murdered that night."

Sato's machine hovered, ready for him, sword in hand. "I don't think you understand the situation, Hydra," he told his oncoming opponent. "This can't be stopped, and it _shouldn't_ be. You of all people should realize that. If it weren't for ZAFT, you would never have had such titanic power; and if it weren't for the Earth Forces' barbarity, my daughter would still be alive."

"I'm sorry about your daughter, Sato," Kevin said calmly, "particularly since she deserved a better father than you. But my power? Yes, we were men granted the power of Titans... but we were, and are, still men! And I'd give all that power back just to live a normal life with the people I love, which is something _you_ apparently don't understand. Life goes on, Sato! No matter how grievous the wounds, there's always something on the other side!"

"You're about to find out... literally," the rogue pilot told him. "You're going to see the other side for yourself, when I kill you."

"You're welcome to try," Kevin Walker said contemptuously, "but I've been there, and I do not fear it. And I will not die today!"

* * *

In _Minerva_'s hangar, four pilots prepared for launch, unaware of the battle taking place outside. It should have been only three, though, and when Shinn saw who the fourth was, he bristled. "What are _you_ doing here, Zala?" he demanded of Athrun. "This isn't your fight."

Athrun shrugged. "Maybe not; but I think _Minerva_ needs all the help she can get, and apparently Chairman Durandal agrees. Besides..." He paused. "Kevin went out there, and he's like a brother to me. He stands to lose a lot more than I do if things go wrong, so I'm not going to sit around here."

Shinn blinked, surprised by the apparent selflessness. _Athrun Zala, of all people, is willing to do something like that... and in part because Kevin Walker is out there? Maybe they're not all bad after all..._ "Okay, then," he said aloud, with a slight smile. "Let's do this, 'Alex'." He tossed off a casual salute, and pushed off for the Impulse's Core Splendor.

Likewise, Lunamaria and Rey made for their own units, and Athrun headed for the ZAKU Warrior that had been prepped for him. To his surprise, though, there was already someone there; a black-haired man in the light green of a mechanic. _Huh?_ "Is there a problem, Mister...?"

"Basilisk," Alec King said quietly, causing Athrun's eyes to widen. "I don't have time to explain, but your buddy used to be my boss, and I thought he'd appreciate it if I personally checked over your machine; not that I feel like I owe him, after what happened five years ago, but under the circumstances..." He shrugged.

Athrun slowly nodded. He didn't know much about Alec King -Kevin had rarely spoken of _any_ of his comrades in ABADDON, even five years later- but he understood why the older man might be reluctant to ascribe his actions to loyalty to his old commander. And he also figured it made sense that Basilisk would do it anyway, because if he was still with ZAFT at all, then he clearly wanted _Minerva_'s mission to succeed.

"I appreciate it," he said at last. "Thanks."

"No problem. Just... keep an eye on the Commander, okay? I don't want him dead before I decide whether or not he truly deserves it, and..." Alec looked away. "My sister wouldn't want to see him die."

Athrun nodded. "I'll do my best. But I wouldn't worry too much about Kevin, Mister... ah, Basilisk. I know from painful experience that it's hard to kill him."

The "mechanic" smiled faintly. "I know what you mean. Good luck out there, Mister 'Dino'." He saluted crisply, then braced his feet on the ZAKU's outer armor and pushed away, retreating from the hangar

The blue-haired ex-ZAFT pilot shook his head as he pulled himself into the ZAKU. _Is _everybody_ using an assumed name on this ship?_ Athrun wondered, settling carefully into the seat and strapping in. _I seem to have met a lot of them on this trip. Kevin's operating under what _he_ considers an alias, _I'm_ using an alias, another ex-Destroyer is using an alias... and then there's that "Hyperion" fellow Kevin ran into... I'll be glad to get back to Orb._

Athrun finished strapping in, began the startup sequence -which wasn't so different from that of the GINNs he'd trained on, years before- and finally nodded in satisfaction. "Bridge, this is Alex Dino," he called, switching on the radio. "I'm ready to go."

_"Likewise,"_ Rey said calmly from his Phantom.

_"Everything's set,"_ Shinn concurred from his machine, and Luna chimed in a moment later with her own acknowledgment.

_"Understood,"_ Meyrin said from the Bridge. _"All units, launch when ready."_

* * *

Amidst the chaos erupting throughout the Debris Belt, one figure was in a position to observe it all. "Fascinating," the pilot of the azure mobile suit murmured to herself. "Perhaps it's Fate...?"

She could see the various ZAFT machines that had already reached the battlefield, as well as the oncoming_ Minerva_ and "Bogey One", both of which appeared to be deploying mobile suits. Then there was the night-black machine that was speeding in from beyond the Debris Belt, and the _Nazca_ carrying Jack Carter...

It was quite the unusual conglomeration of forces, even more bizarre than the Four Ships Alliance had been; this would be a cataclysmic battle, where every side fought each other, and the price of failure was a fatal blow to the planet below.

The sniper had no intention of letting that happen. "Time to make my presence known," she murmured to herself, and lifted her mobile suit's sniper rifle.

* * *

Gladys stared at the display in consternation, thinking hard about the battle that had suddenly erupted. "Those are GINN High Maneuver types," she murmured to Durandal. "The more recent Mark II model, no less. Where did they get them...?"

"I don't know," he answered thoughtfully, "but I think it was fortunate we accepted the Baron's offer of assistance. Most of our pilots are green, while he seems to be getting back on his feet and fighting the way he did in the old days."

_"Indeed he is,"_ Arkanian said in his ear. _"Fascinating. Well, at least this seems to have confirmed my hypothesis: that _is_ Sato out there, though what he's doing, I'm not sure. Something about his daughter and how Zala was betrayed, from the sound of it, which explains why he's so interested in killing Kevin."_

"Because he killed Zala personally, you mean?"

_"Da. And also, Kevin was close by when Junius Seven was destroyed, or so I gather; his survival may be another thing Sato's furious about. Hard to say, with that maniac. Be wary, Chairman; something smells bad about all this. This attack _must_ be stopped." _There was absolute conviction in her words; she'd been born not far from one of the worst nuclear disasters in history, and had a fine appreciation for this sort of thing.

"It will be, Delta, it will be."

Gladys, unaware of the sub-vocal conversation behind her, was still musing on the situation. "Those are rogue ZAFT forces, certainly," she said quietly, "but who...?"

"I'm afraid I can answer that," Durandal said, equally quiet. "The one the Baron and Commander Colde spoke to, Sato? He used to be in the ABADDON support unit, and later served as the leader of the Next-Generation Special Forces. Those with him are likely remnants of the NGSF, as well."

She closed her eyes. "That isn't good," she stated. "I met Sato briefly myself, when I was briefly assigned to ABADDON; and if those with him are also of that kind, it's no wonder we're having difficulties. Those augmented with the 'Hydra genes' genes consistently outperformed normal ZAFT pilots, and that was before they went crazy. Those with the strength of the insane..."

"Sato won't survive this," Durandal told her. "No matter what else happens, there's no way the Baron will let him live. You know his war record as well as I do: those connected with ABADDON were ruthlessly hunted down and killed; he was even more implacable in his hunt for them than for Blue Cosmos operatives."

"True enough," Gladys agreed. "I've long known it's not a good idea to get on his bad side-"

She broke off as the Bridge hatch slid open, admitting Cagalli. "Where are Kevin and Alex?" she asked without preamble. "Are they still okay?"

"Baron Onishi is currently involved in a battle that's broken out," Durandal replied, "and Alex is on his way to it, but for now, yes, they're both fine."

Cagalli stared at the displays herself, and said nothing. _Be careful, you two,_ she thought to the pilots. _I lost too many people in the last war; I can't lose you guys, too!_

Her head snapped up abruptly. "What exactly is Kevin doing?" she demanded. "You said he's involved in a battle already; with who and what?"

Gladys winced. "Several Mark II GINN High Maneuver units," she said carefully, "more specifically one piloted by what seems to be the group's leader, someone called Sato. He... used to be in the same unit as the Baron."

Cagalli closed her eyes with a sigh. "No wonder," she whispered. "If he was with ABADDON, then Kevin will stop at nothing to kill him..."

"I'm afraid so," Durandal agreed. "All we can do is pray that the Baron's skill hasn't deserted him since the last time he flew in combat." He gazed out the forward viewport. "It's all up to them now..."

* * *

Aboard "Bogey One", the three stolen machines were also beginning their launch preparations, readying themselves to go into battle once again.

_"Remember,"_ Neo told Auel -the nominal leader of the three- from _Girty Lue_'s Bridge, _"we don't know what's going on here yet. All we know is that the remains of Junius Seven are falling, and ZAFT units appear to be involved. Don't let your guard down... especially since we're now certain Kevin Walker is personally involved in these events."_

"Are you sure he's that much of a threat, Sir?" Auel questioned. "He wasn't much of a problem when we were taking these machines from Armory One..."

_"Bet on it,"_ Neo said grimly. _"He was rusty then; and still is now, I suppose. But he was good enough to fight me to a stalemate last time, and don't forget what he did during the war, and before it. Records clearly state that he once killed over a hundred well-trained troops in a single battle without even being scratched. How much of that was due to his cybernetics I don't know, and it doesn't really matter, either. He's good, and he's fast. Remember that."_

"Understood, Captain." And with that injunction from Neo Roanoke, the three stolen mobile suits -Abyss, Chaos, and Gaia- launched into the blackness of space, preparing for the unknown battle to follow within the cluttered debris fields.

* * *

"You are a real pain in the gluteus maximus, Sato," Kevin grunted, dashing across space towards the leader of the aggressor forces, "and you should've died five years ago, with the rest." He fired a powerful emerald bolt from his combined rifles as he came, forcing the HM GINN to dodge to one side.

"Going to try to fix your mistake now, 'Commander'?" Sato asked with a sneer, returning fire before spinning around and dashing away. "You won't find me as easy to kill as Chairman Zala was; not when you've so obviously lost your touch, Hydra!"

"Don't call me that," Kevin hissed, chasing after him. "And don't underestimate me, you nekulturny vnyebrachnyi!"

"I see you still like Delta's insults," Sato remarked, pausing to spit emerald fire back at the Sturm Vogel. "Though I'd have thought 'uncultured bastard' would be somewhat redundant."

The Baron cursed under his breath as the beam melted a furrow through his right wing, but he didn't stop his chase. "Redundant or not, Sato, you're still a bastard... and your very existence has become redundant. I didn't irradiate myself two years ago just so that people like you could try to destroy everything we fought for." Gripping his rifle in both hands, he split the weapon apart, holding a lesser version in either hand for a double attack. "Too many people died for the peace we obtained!"

The HM GINN put aside its own beam rifle, dodging between the pair of emerald darts spat toward it by the Sturm Vogel, and pulled out the katana-like sword sheathed at its hip. "Peace?" Sato snorted. "What 'peace'? Barely two years have gone by, and already both sides are back on the road to war. The only solution left is Patrick Zala's solution, and now I'll finish the job you interrupted at Jachin Due!"

Kevin locked the Sturm Vogel's rifles on the machine's thighs, and pulled a beam saber's hilt from its compartment in the right shoulder. "Not happening," he shot back, igniting the blade of frozen fire. "I've given my life enough times, and I won't let you undo my last sacrifice."

The two machines rapidly closed the gap between them, and Sato grinned tightly. "You won't stop me," he told his former comrade, "not this time. Let this be our last battlefield, Hydra!"

"For once, we are in agreement." They came within meters of each other, and blades swung inward...

* * *

Pressed carefully against a bulkhead, taking a cautious look around the corner of the corridor intersection, Flay Allster decided right then and there that she wished she'd never left the _Dominion_. This particular escape was becoming positively eerie... and it didn't help that she was quite certain the enemy was going to be looking for her soon. There hadn't been much she could do with the corpse in her quarters, after all, and even if she'd managed to hide the body, the others would've noticed he was missing eventually.

Flay had found, during her initial, tense scouting, that the situation was even worse than she'd thought. Carter's own guards had obviously been removed -and the bloodstains on the bulkheads boded ill for their fates- and she'd even found the chef dead, with a hole between the eyes and the back of his skull missing.

Clearly, Baron Onishi had taken complete control of Carter's colony base, and its corridors were now roamed by identical copies of Flay's old captain, most of them with blank expressions and heavy firepower. The only points in her favor were that very few people realized what Kevin had taught her, and that most of the clones were apparently of limited intellect, acting more like guard dogs than human beings. _Which means I may still have a chance, if I can find my way to the hangars._ She knew Carter kept a number of captured mobile suits there, at least one of which was probably capable of atmospheric reentry... or so she judged from a gloating comment of his that she'd overheard, something about having stolen "Impulse Unit Two" -apparently a new ZAFT design- though whether it had been built by ZAFT or made from stolen plans, she didn't know... or care.

Now she took a few deep breaths, flexed her fingers on the grip of the pistol she'd taken from the clone corpse -after changing into a flightsuit Carter had left in her quarters' closet- and ducked around the corner, moving with quick, nervous steps to the next corner, hoping all the while that she could remember enough of the few lessons Kevin had given her. If she remembered right, there was a security control room nearby; it was a secondary center, which meant there was a reasonable chance it was unoccupied.

_After all,_ Flay thought snidely, _there's nobody here but one traitor, a couple hundred mindless clones... and little old me, a girl with no idea how to survive on her own. Heh; just let them keep thinking that a little longer. They think they know me, but all they know is how I was _before_ they forced me to kill... Now I understand Kevin a little better. Once you've done it once, there's no turning back._

Reaching the appropriate hatch, she pressed herself against the bulkhead next to it, checked the stolen pistol one more time, and hit the control to open the hatch.

Flay strained her ears, trying to tell what -if anything- was going on inside the room. It was dark, but that meant little; Kevin's eyes, even without enhancements, could see with much less light than most, so the darkness might mean nothing... but the snoring she gradually perceived _did_ mean something, and she couldn't help but chuckle inwardly. _Well, that's helpful; they're so confident he fell asleep on the job! But I can't take any chances, not with someone based on Kevin's genes. The slightest sound might wake him up, unless I'm very careful... and take care of things._

She slipped inside, grateful for the soft soles of the flightsuit's boots, and waited for her eyes to adjust as the hatch slid shut behind her. As she'd inferred, one of the mass-produced clones was slumped in the chair, dead to both the world and the myriad of screens displaying surveillance camera footage. As he was, he was no threat... but it would be far, far too easy for him to wake up and end her escape before it truly began. That left only one option.

Flay raised the pistol, focused on the dimly glowing tritium three-dot sights, and shot the clone in the back of the head.

The explosive sound that filled the room deafened her for a moment -causing her to curse herself for forgetting how loud unsuppressed handguns were- but the effect on the clone was far more extreme. Prompted by a last, uncontrolled neural impulse from his shattered brain, his body lunged out of the chair, most of his skull missing, and collapsed over the security control panel.

Flay winced, a corner of her mind reflecting that if she'd still been wearing a dress, this would've ruined it, and pushed the corpse aside. _No time for that now,_ her mind whispered. _He's dead; now you have to worry about surviving to get out of here, and warn Kevin..._

Deliberately putting the blood and... other things on the panel out of her mind, she bent over the console, frowned, and called up a status check. So far, things seemed fairly normal; Onishi's shuttle was still in the hangar, but it was unguarded, and none of them seemed to have realized yet that the one sent to kill her was dead. _Which means I still have a little ti-_

Flay's thoughts were interrupted by a blaring alarm, and the voice of one of the clones -apparently the one Onishi had called "Benedict"- came over the base's PA system. _"Alert! Alert! Subject Allster has killed one of our number and escaped! Find her, and shoot on sight! Repeat, find Allster and shoot on sight!"_

"Well, so much for that," Flay muttered in disgust, watching the sudden explosion of movement on the various monitors. "They definitely didn't get much of Kevin's personality in the cloning; if he bothered to take somebody prisoner, he wouldn't turn around and shoot them the instant they got loose..."

She trailed off, and paused at the sight of one of the monitors. It was of the corridor just outside that very room, with a clone hurrying toward it...

Flay turned, walked calmly to the hatch, and waited for it to open. When it did, and a surprised clone froze in the hatchway, she smiled pleasantly, inwardly surprised by her own calm. "The announcement said I'd killed one of you," she said easily. "Actually, it's two." She motioned at the corpse.

The clone reached for his own sidearm, still surprised. "What's going on he-"

"You make three," Flay said calmly, and shot him between the eyes.

* * *

"What in the world is going _on_ in this place, anyway?" Athrun wondered, as he and his fellow pilots finally arrived at the battlezone. "I thought this was supposed to be routine... or as routine as it can be when colony drops are involved, anyway." Still, he didn't allow his confusion to affect his actions; he smoothly drew a bead on the nearest HM GINN, corrected for relative motion, and pulled the trigger.

Yzak's head snapped around as he both saw the enemy be speared by the emerald bolt and heard the transmission. _"Athrun?"_ he said in disbelief. "What are _you_ doing here?" His lip curled. "This is no place for a civilian like you, Athrun!"

Athrun chuckled. "You haven't changed a bit, Yzak. I volunteered, okay? _Minerva_ didn't have enough pilots... and I couldn't just let Kevin come out here by himself."

"...I can understand that," the silver-haired pilot conceded reluctantly; during his time on the _Dominion,_ he'd come to respect the ex-ZAFT super-soldier, and -having seen the almost mystic way Kevin Walker had of inspiring trust and friendship- could understand Athrun's sentiments. "Still," Yzak hedged, "don't get in my way, got that? This isn't like the old days, and I don't take orders from you anymore."

"Wouldn't have it any other way, Yzak," the other pilot replied with a smile.

Dearka smirked. "Don't mind him, Athrun; he's just cranky. _I'm_ glad you're here, anyway." He paused. "By the way, how's everybody doing? I... kinda lost track after the war. I know where Max is, but..."

Athrun raised an eyebrow. "Miriallia, right? Well, I haven't seen her lately myself, but Kevin tells me she and Tolle kind of drifted apart within a few months after you went back to ZAFT; she's working as a war reporter these days, or so Kevin tells me."

The blonde-haired pilot's eyebrows rose. "They broke up? That's... surprising." There was an odd note in his voice, but Athrun didn't have time to figure out what it was before the green ZAKU spun around, raised its cannon, and fired a burst of red-orange fire at the nearest HM GINN. For an instant, the stream connected the two machines, as fierce energy melted and shattered its way through the mobile suit's armor, and then it pierced the cockpit.

As the GINN erupted in a fireball, Shinn was taking a look around the area. The Sturm Vogel was still pursuing the lead enemy, with the two pilots exchanging philosophy and insults... and one of the other HM GINN's was sneaking up behind the prototype Kevin flew. "Baron, watch it!" Shinn shouted in pure reflex, forgetting his antipathy for the Orb nobleman.

Kevin's head snapped around, and he started to abort his thrust at Sato, but the change caught him in a bad position. He was overextended toward Sato, and now he was caught facing neither enemy. Sato took advantage of the distraction, bringing his sword down on the Sturm Vogel's right shoulder; it slowed as it came into contact with the armor, but resolutely continued on and carved a slice out of it, narrowly avoiding a 'disarming' blow. "Vnyebrachnyi-!" Kevin started, knowing there was no way he'd stop the other GINN in time...

A blade of frozen fire appeared in the center of the GINN's torso, melting through armor, pilot, and cockpit hatch alike, before ripping up through the head, then back down between its legs. "Take that, you miserable bastard," a voice, nearly identical to Kevin's, told the dead enemy.

Athrun stared in shock at the machine which had just saved his friend. "It... can't be," he whispered. "That was destroyed two years ago, at the end of the war..."

Kevin had his own reason for looking askance at ZGMF-X09A Justice, for he _recognized_ the voice that had spoken from it. Athrun had met the pilot once himself, but only briefly; whereas Kevin had the scars to prove they'd met...

"Carter," he whispered. "What are _you_ doing here?"

* * *

On _Minerva_'s Bridge, every eye was fixed on the machine that had suddenly arrived, until Gladys turned around to look at Cagalli. "Lady Cagalli," she said carefully, "it was my understanding that that machine was decommissioned and scrapped at the end of the conflict two years ago. Did you have anything to do with its appearance here?"

Cagalli quickly shook her head. "No, Captain, I didn't. As far as I knew, it _was_ destroyed; I saw the paperwork..." Her voice trailed off, and a new thought occurred to her. _Unless Kevin falsified the paperwork... which would be entirely his style, the creep!_ She didn't know whether to be furious or glad at Kevin's apparent deception. On the one hand, if this _was_ his doing, it meant he'd been lying to her; on the other, the Justice had just saved his life..._ Wait a second; that voice...!_

She wasn't the only one to notice, or so she judged from the radio transmission that followed. _"Carter? What are _you_ doing here?"_

_"Saving your hide, apparently,"_ Jack Carter shot back. _"You're losing your touch, Walker, if a pipsqueak like that GINN could give you so much trouble."_

_"I'm out of practice,"_ Kevin replied irritably. _"But why the blazes did you just save my life? And what _are_ you doing here, anyway?"_

_"I've got no more love for the Earth Forces than you do, Walker,"_ Carter told him. _"When I heard about Armory One, I headed out, because I thought the Earth Forces had done it, and I didn't want the balance of power to shift in their favor. Then when I got here, my exec noticed that Junius Seven was moving... and much as I want you dead, Walker, I _don't_ want Earth destroyed. I'm not a monster, and even if I was, I wouldn't want the planet blown up, because _I_ happen to live in this world, too. As for saving you..."_ He paused uncomfortably. _"The fact is, unfortunately, that I think you're more good to me alive than dead, at the moment. But don't expect this truce to be permanent!"_ he added quickly.

_"Never entered my head,"_ Kevin agreed. _"Well, I appreciate the assistance, even if I hate your guts. I won't attack you if you don't attack me, and if you'll just leave this fellow to me, we'll all be happy. Got it?"_

_"Whatever you say. I don't _want_ to fight by your side, Walker."_

The two machines split off, with the Justice moving to help out Dearka and Yzak, and Cagalli moved quickly to a radio microphone. "Kevin, just what's going on here?" she demanded. "Did you have anything to do with the Justice appearing here?"

_"Eta kuram na smekh,"_ Kevin replied. _"You know better than that; Carter and I hate each other's guts. Sorry,"_ he added, as the Sturm Vogel's thrusters glowed to life, _"gotta go."_

Gladys glanced at Cagalli after the transmission cut off. "What did he say?" she asked, puzzled. "I heard his instructor say that once or twice, but I never found out what it means."

The younger woman smiled slightly. "It was Russian; literally means 'That's for chickens to laugh at'. It means he thought what I said was ridiculous, which I guess it was. I can't imagine those two working together on _anything_ if they had a choice."

Durandal nodded. "So that was John Carter," he mused. "The final survivor of the Serpent Head project."

"That's _Jack_ Carter," Cagalli corrected, a slight edge in her voice. "A man who looks a lot like him is called John, and _he_ happens to be a good friend. Like a brother, really."

_"She's probably talking about a fellow called John Tyler,"_ Arkanian said in Durandal's ear; evidently she'd been remotely accessing _Minerva_'s systems again. _"He used to work for Le Creuset, if you'll remember; better known as Invictus, the silent, armored assassin. He was the unauthorized twenty-third clone of Hydra, and worked as Le Creuset's personal hatchetman in exchange for information about Hydra's whereabouts and the freedom to hunt the Serpent Heads. Within three weeks after Heliopolis was destroyed, he took his leave of Le Creuset's employment, killed a team sent by Zala to assassinate him, and dropped off the face of the earth; the next time he was heard from, he was working with the Clyne Faction, and was later apparently instrumental in the seizure of the _Dominion,_ which he served aboard as fire-control officer. After the war, no further records exist. The situation with Kevin's executive officer is similar; they apparently both disappeared after the war, presumably to retire and avoid retribution from both sides."_

"You've been doing your homework lately," Durandal murmured. "I'm impressed you've managed to assemble so much data so quickly, Natalya Ivanova."

_"Kevin Walker is a dangerous man,"_ Delta replied. _"He also tends to associate with dangerous people; they bear watching, and it's surprisingly easy to find information on people who are known to be dangerous. In this case, however, most of my data comes from ZAFT intelligence sources. The classified files -ones which only people like Zala had access to, as well as a few that appear to have been created by Eileen Canaver- contain dossiers on a number of the Four Ships Alliance's personnel, particularly those with close connections to Kevin Walker. However, most of them -indeed, almost all, save for Cagalli Yula Athha, Yzak Joule, and Dearka Elsman- cut off at the end of the war. The entire complements of all four ships appear to have gathered at the Onishi mansion, but after that, they vanished. Some of them, I believe _still_ reside at that mansion, but it's impossible to say for sure, or who they are if they _are_ there."_

"They set up new identities," he murmured, "in order to survive, and to put the war behind them... Hm. Can't blame them, really. Keep working on it, Delta; I have a feeling that the Baron has a few surprises in store for us, and I'd really rather know about them _before_ they blow up in our faces."

_"Roger that."_ There was an unmistakable chuckle, and then the transmission cut out.

Burt Heim abruptly stiffened in his chair. "Heat sources detected," he reported tersely. "Checking catalogue... they're the stolen prototypes, Captain!"

Gladys' gaze snapped to the display, and her eyes narrowed. "Then 'Bogey One' is out here somewhere, as well," she said, almost to herself. "Meyrin, warn our pilots that-"

"They already know," Cagalli interrupted, watching the screen intently. "Kevin does, anyway. So does Leona."

Indeed, the Sturm Vogel and the steel-gray ZAKU had hesitated fractionally, before returning to their own targets, and now both transmitted warnings to their fellows without missing a beat.

"But how did they _know?"_ Gladys wondered.

Cagalli shook her head. "I don't know for sure, but I can guess. They're both empaths, Captain, and Kevin's a very powerful one. How do you think he stopped the Gaia's attack with his eyes closed in that last battle?"

Gladys nodded minutely. "I suppose... but I must admit, I still find it hard to credit such ephemeral, almost mythic abilities."

"The mind is still only barely understood, Captain," Durandal reminded her. "It's a documented fact that some people -even Naturals- have a faint sense of electromagnetic fields, and emotions _do_ have measurable effects on body chemistry and the like. It's possible that the Baron's genetic engineering makes him highly sensitive to those changes, even from a distance... or perhaps more of his brain is active than in a normal human. I doubt even he truly knows..."

"Excuse me," Trine broke in, "but don't you think we should do something about Bogey One? They're the ones who attacked Armory One..."

"Perhaps," Durandal conceded. "However, it may well be that they think _we_ were the ones who began Junius Seven's plunge, rather than a rogue element."

_Minerva_'s exec stared in incomprehension. "Us? But... With all due respect, Sir, that's crazy!"

Gladys gazed thoughtfully at the battle, contemplating the matter. _Yes, it sounds insane on the face of it, but... _"No," she said aloud, "it isn't crazy. Think about it, Arthur: those are High Maneuver GINNs out there; what do you think it looks like to them? I know that if they were Daggers of some sort, _I_ would think it was the Earth Forces behind this incident."

"That may well be part of the rogue faction's plan," Durandal agreed. "They must know that few -if any- of them will get out of this alive; perhaps they intend to use their deaths to pin the blame for this incident on the PLANTs, thus _forcing_ us to take the war to the Earth Forces in self-defense against their inevitable retaliatory strike."

"That's a pretty complicated plan, Sir," Trine protested. "They couldn't rely on something like that actually working."

"No," the Chairman agreed, "they couldn't. But if they realize that they're not going to survive this, then I expect it doesn't matter to them whether it works or not, as long as the potential for it exists." He nodded at the display, where the Sturm Vogel still dueled with the renegade leader. "And I might point out that plans of that sort aren't unheard of; _his_ unit was once intended to act as an _agent provocateur_ in order to manipulate Patrick Zala's foes." He turned to Gladys. "Captain, I suggest we attempt to contact Bogey One; right now, stopping the fall of Junius Seven is our overriding concern, and if they'll agree to a truce, it would be to our advantage."

She nodded. "Agreed. Meyrin, send out the request over the International Distress Channel."

"Yes, Captain."

* * *

"Who _are_ these guys?" Athrun wondered, as the three stolen machines closed the gap and came within firing range of the _Minerva_'s units. "Is Kevin right about them being Earth Forces...?"

"I don't think it matters," Luna told him, raising her ZAKU's beam cannon. "At least now we have another chance to take them back, right?"

"Negative, Luna," Shinn cut in before Athrun could reply. "That's not our mission today. We're supposed to stop the colony drop, not take on these guys; we'll just have to fight them off, make sure they can't get to the Joule team's GuAIZs."

"...You're right," Luna conceded reluctantly. "So let's get to it." Immediately following her words, her finger squeezed the trigger, and a powerful red-orange bolt erupted from her cannon and scorched across space toward the three enemy units.

They scattered immediately, and Stellar sniffed as she guided the Gaia toward the ZAKU that had nearly shot her. "That wasn't nice," she said coldly. "You'll pay for it."

"You guys get the others," Luna called, preparing for another shot. "I've got the Gaia."

"Roger that," Shinn agreed, and rushed toward the Abyss. _You may have succeeded against Walker,_ he thought, raising his beam rifle, _but I'm a tougher customer than he was. Come and get it!_

That left Athrun facing the Chaos by default, and his eyes narrowed as it approached him. _Remote, wireless weapon pods,_ he thought to himself, examining the machine even as it deployed the pods. _Like Providence's DRAGOON system, only not as good..._

"Just a mass-produced machine," Sting murmured to himself. "I can handle this just fine." He opened up with Chaos' beam rifle, expecting it to shear right through the ZAKU's arm, even as his weapon pods poured beams and missiles at it from two other angles... but his calculations were off.

"You're not bringing me down _that_ easy!" Athrun called, and reversed thrust, kicking himself backwards. The attacks from Chaos continued toward the point he'd just left, and missiles and beams converged on the same spot, annihilating each other in furious light. "I can't afford to lose this battle."

Sting frowned, surprised by his opponent's skill. "He's better than I thought," he muttered. "But nobody gets lucky twice!" He triggered another salvo from his weapon pods, effectively exhausting their missile loads in an effort to obliterate this... this pest that was refusing to just give up and die.

Athrun contemptuously twisted and dove around the salvo, allowing beams to harmlessly scorch past mere meters from his machine, while his machine launched a salvo of its own missiles, precisely targeting the incoming warheads and blasting them apart. "I told you, it's not going to be that easy!" He charged forward, bringing his rifle to bear on Chaos and spitting an emerald dart at the captured unit.

Sting uttered a strangled curse as the green energy caught Chaos in the right arm, melting a furrow along the wrist. "Now you've done it," he growled. "Take th-"

The ZAKU's torso twisted, its arm came up, and it fired once, shifted slightly to the side, and fired again in the span of half a second. Two streaks of emerald light scorched across the black of space, and each impacted directly on one of the remote weapon pods. They hung their for a moment, holes smashed clear through them, and then detonated in violent, near-simultaneous explosions, vomiting debris and flames into space.

Now Sting openly gaped. "Who _is_ this guy? _Nobody's_ that good!"

Leona, who had just parried a slash from a GINN by slicing right through it with her saber, glanced toward Athrun's ZAKU and flashed a grin. "Good work, mon ami. Looks like you haven't lost your touch."

"Not likely," he agreed, and turned his attention back to Sato. "Let's continue where we left off, Sato," he said coldly. "You and I, we have a score to settle... don't we?"

Sato nodded sharply. "Neither of us will leave this place alive, Hydra. I'm going down with this colony, to be with my daughter... and you're going to die first, for the crime of murdering Patrick Zala and obliterating GENESIS, the one true hope for the PLANTs."

A beam saber blazed to life in the Sturm Vogel's hand. "A crime? Oh, no, Sato, it wasn't a crime... it was vengeance. A vengeance I'll complete here and now." The fiery blade snapped up in a classic fencer's salute. "Let's dance!"

* * *

In a place far removed from the chaos of the battle that would once again decide the fate of the entire world, a woman with brown hair and silver eyes prowled a dimly-lit chamber occupied by eleven other people. She wore a form-fitting black suit that fit like a glove; Kevin Onishi -or better yet, Walker- would've recognized it as a suit of unpowered body armor, developed by the Destroyers.

Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, better known to some by the codename "Delta", looked over her eleven subordinates._ They're not as good as the original twelve,_ she thought critically, _but it was hard enough to scrape up even that many with their extraordinary abilities. And if these aren't up to their level, they're certainly the next best thing._

Gazing at each silent, patient soldier in turn, she mentally went over their codenames. _Mongoose, Meerkat, Wyvern... Tiamat, Draken,_ _Fafnir, Uroboros..._ _Fenrir, Phoenix, Dhampir, and Vampire... Hmph. The codenames just don't have the ring that the old ones did._ Nor did she know their real names; when they became part of the new unit, their previous histories were erased... especially in the cases of Tiamat, Draken, Wyvern, and Fafnir, what with their... unusual modifications. Then there were the pair with codenames taken from real creatures, because of their intended purpose, as the hunters of the remaining Serpent of ABADDON. Mongoose and Meerkat... _Kevin would probably scoff at those two; but if I do have to set them on his trail, he'll think differently soon enough. After all, I wouldn't trust them to go out without me..._

"The eleven of you," Arkanian began without preamble, "are part of something special. Five years ago, this was attempted before, but failed because the unit's creator was a certifiable madman, and the chosen leader of the unit was an unwilling victim of brainwashing. Today, we have made none of the mistakes of the past, and you, my comrades, will become what ABADDON could not: ZAFT's hidden sword, capable of the most dangerous missions, the ones others would say are impossible." She paused significantly. _"We,_ my comrades, are the _new_ ABADDON."

Theirs was a unit that had been brought back from the dead, in more ways than one. Officially disbanded after the nuclear explosion that had terminated the original experiment, most of the old unit was dead; the only confirmed survivors were Hydra, Kraken, and whoever this mysterious "Hyperion" was.

It had taken most of the five years since the end of the Project for ZAFT scientists to reverse-engineer the cybernetic augmentation within Arkanian's body, and even now there were some elements of it that were not completely understood. Oracle and his team of scientists had been working on technologies far in advance of anything ZAFT as a whole had, and much of it was mystery even now. As it was, they'd managed to at least duplicate it, and so these eleven new soldiers stood before their leader, their systems less sophisticated than those of old but making them physically superior to normal soldiers nonetheless.

"You all know the truth of the old unit," Arkanian resumed. "How they were destroyed because the psychopathic scientist Jeffrey Harris, codename Oracle, chose for the unit's leader an unwilling subject, whose mind simply could not handle the strain after memory of his torturous introduction to the Project returned. That, comrades, is a mistake we will not repeat. But understand something: Kevin Walker, the Hydra, is _not_ a target of ours. It may become necessary to... discipline the man, as his hatred of ZAFT runs deep, but my intention is to bring him back into our fold. He will never again where ZAFT uniform, I am sure, but he may yet rejoin the unit he once led, _if_ we can prove to him that we are better than Oracle's band of madmen."

"You truly believe you can convince Hydra to join us?" Tiamat asked, skeptical.

Delta smiled. "You underestimate my powers of persuasion, tovarisch. I have always been able to handle even the Hydra when he became stubborn; at the least, he won't interfere with us. It is also my intent," she continued, "to bring back any other members of the original unit who have survived. I suspect that the other of ABADDON's Twin Serpents, Alec 'Basilisk' King, also survives, as well as at least one other, in the guise of the armored soldier Hyperion. If we can bring them back, we will truly be a formidable unit, my comrades. With the strength of even the Hydra among us, there will be no army that can stand against us. Only ZAFT has the technology to create us; though Earth will, inevitably, acquire the knowledge for themselves, that will take time, and until then, we will be unrivaled."

Wyvern frowned. "Conquest, Commander? That... does not sit well with me."

Arkanian gave him an approving look. "Nor should it, my friend, for conquest has never been ZAFT's goal. No, our duties would be more along the lines of the old saying about the best defense: we will be the 'good offense', launching raids where we must, destroying only what we must." She stood directly in front of them, and raised her hand in the ZAFT salute. "ABADDON has been reborn, comrades, and this time, we will _not_ fail in our mission!"

* * *

"We're receiving a message from the _Minerva,_ Captain," _Girty Lue_'s communications officer reported. "They're requesting a truce for the duration of the current situation, in order to deal with this threat to both the PLANTs and Earth."

Ian Lee glanced at his captain. "Do you think this is sincere, Sir?"

Neo Roanoke nodded slowly. "Yes, Ian, I do. I realize those are ZAFT units attempting to bring Junius Seven down, but even if I thought the PLANTs insane enough to sanction this, there's one factor that would prevent me from believing they were behind it." He pointed to the display, where the Sturm Vogel could be seen taking a hit from the leader of the renegades. "I know Kevin Walker's reputation. He loathes both sides, but he would never condone an attack such as this... if only because _he_ lives on Earth, too. No, if he's helping _Minerva,_ then ZAFT had nothing to do with this incident."

Lee nodded slowly. "So... do we accept the truce, then?"

Neo shook his head. "Of course not. In the first place, we can't afford to have any more information about us released than we can avoid... and we have other instructions, anyway. As long as we don't interfere with the deployment of the meteor breakers, we can do some damage to ZAFT while still allowing them to prevent the colony drop... and then blame this whole incident on the PLANTs afterwards. Simplicity itself, Ian."

His exec stared at him. "That's _simple,_ Sir?"

The masked man shrugged. "Let's just say we learned a few tricks from Walker, when he was still active. He usually preferred the direct approach back then, but he wasn't above manipulating people to make them do what he wanted... and our superiors are old hands at the practice, as well. You know as well as I the _truth_ of the Mendel Incident."

Lee nodded slowly. An odd truism of the last few years was that any time something important was happening, Kevin Walker was usually involved somehow. The Mandelbrot Incident had led -indirectly, at least- to his genesis as a super-soldier, the Mendel Incident had involved him directly, he left Junius Seven mere hours before the attack, and then the following year of war... He had supposedly played a decisive role there, as well, and it was entirely predictable that he'd end up embroiled in the new conflict that seemed to be brewing.

"So what happens then, Sir?" he asked. "If we _do_ blame this on the PLANTs... where does that lead?"

"I don't know, Ian," Neo said honestly. "But if you want my opinion... I think it'll lead us back into war." He shook his head. "I just hope our superiors know what they're doing. Unless he dies here, I don't doubt the Crimson Tiger will oppose us again. It's in his nature..."

He frowned then, as the same, bizarre sense of recognition nagged at the back of his mind. _I know more about him than I can remember,_ he thought, _but _how?_ I've never met him, but that mental probe during the battle.. Who _is _he, anyway?_

* * *

It was finally beginning to work. Another GuAIZ R had been lost in the process, but the meteor breakers were finally in place, and cracks began to grow in the structure of the ruins of the old space colony... cracks that grew into ever-larger fissures.

Yzak noted this, and nodded his approval. "C'mon, Snake," he called, "get out of there! I know you want to kill the guy, but some things are more important than your personal vendettas. We need to make sure this thing completely breaks up!"

Kevin shook himself, and forced his mind to step back from the vengeance he thirsted for. "You're right," he conceded reluctantly -and not without a trace of irony; Yzak was a fine one to talk about there being more important things than vendettas- and boosted away from Sato's GINN. "You still won't get out of this alive," he said coldly, "but I don't have time to deal with you properly, Sato. My revenge for ABADDON will have to wait."

"You never could finish what you started, Hydra," Sato sneered. "And you still can't quite remember to watch your back!"

Kevin started to turn, and Dearka's eyes widened, for once again a GINN had snuck up behind the Sturm Vogel. This time, even the Justice was in no position to assist, and the katana that had been drawn back began to sweep forward for a vicious, bisecting blow...

Seven kilometers distant, within an azure mobile suit, a finger squeezed on a trigger.

An emerald beam streaked across space, its source so far as to be completely unsuspected by the renegades, and struck the HM GINN right between the wings, piercing the back armor, cockpit, and hatch... passing through pilot and energy battery alike on the way. The entire mobile suit flared white, and tore itself apart.

Kevin breathed deep, willing his heart to slow, and boosted over to Yzak and Dearka. He opened his mouth to speak... and then paused, as his mastoid radio activated on its own. _"Now you see it,"_ the same voice from before whispered. _"See the measures embittered men will reach for, the measures which humanity is willing to resort to in the name of justice, revenge, and genocide. And also... the lengths to which good men and women will go to stop them. Will this be Judgment Day, my commander? Or will this be but a foretaste of what is to come? Only you, I fear, can decide that... for now, as ever, you remain a key figure in it all. Your choices led to this time, when you would become embroiled in it all. You role is not always crucial, but it is ever-present on the grand stage. All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players... and your part, however great or small, will always be significant. Always in the midst of these calamities you have been, and in the midst of the storms to come you will surely be. On your shoulders rests the Fate of us all, just as it did two years ago... Yet this time, it would seem the turn to save was mine. We all owe you, my commander, and I have done my best to begin payment of that vast debt."_

Then the voice was gone, leaving naught but questions in its wake.

* * *

"For all that they figured out how to use them quickly," Luna mused aloud, dodging to one side as Gaia fired a barrage from beam rifle and back-mounted cannons, "they don't seem to be very good with them, do they?"

"Better than rookies should be," Rey said slowly, "but not as good veterans ought to be by now. Their skill in stealing them says they ought to be better than this... The Le Creuset team was, with the machines they stole from Heliopolis, as I remember it." He snapped off a shot at the Abyss, and before Auel could dodge the beam bored through his machine's right "wing", tearing one of its beam emitters apart.

Shinn raised his shield to ward off a beam from Chaos, allowing the emerald drat to splatter harmlessly against the anti-beam coating, and shrugged. "I don't mind," he told his compatriot. "If they can't figure out to how to use them right, it's all the better for us, right? Besides, better this than someone like Walker. He _did_ fly for the Earth Forces for a while, remember."

"With, not for, Shinn," Luna corrected, sounding troubled... as she always did, when discussing that particular warrior. "The records that Chairman Canaver _did_ allow to remain clearly say that he only served on the _Archangel _because he trusted the individuals aboard it, and his Earth Forces rank was only a courtesy from Rear Admiral Halberton. The last time he fought on the side of the Earth Alliance was the Battle of Alaska, and during the Battle of Orb he was ruthless in his destruction of Earth Forces units." Allowing another beam to scorch past her, she rushed the Gaia, and slammed her ZAKU's foot into its head, sending it tumbling away.

"Indeed," Rey agreed. "His siding with the Earth Alliance was for convenience only; that man always has his own objective."

"And what _is_ that objective?" Shinn demanded, chasing Chaos toward the colony ruins. "Just what _does_ that guy hope to accomplish? I always thought he was just another mindless Orb supporter, but..."

"He supports the Chief Representative, Shinn," Luna told him. "Judging from what I've heard of him as the Baron, though, that's very different from supporting Orb as a whole. He's got some kind of feud going with Orb's Prime Minister and his entire family, and apparently, during the war, he stated many times that he doesn't care at all for nations or organizations... except maybe his own." She shrugged. "As far as I can tell, his objective is usually vengeance... and not much can get in his way when he decides someone has to die."

"Yes," Rey murmured. "It was he who killed Patrick Zala, after all, and destroyed GENESIS, at the cost of his own life... however temporary the sacrifice may have been." He frowned, gazing ahead at the colony remnants. "It seems to be working," he announced. "Junius Seven is breaking up... and the stolen units are heading straight for it. What are they up to...?" He keyed his radio. "Commander Joule, the stolen machines are heading your way."

"I see them," Athrun responded for his old comrade. "Watch it, Yzak, they're going straight for-"

"I told you already, I don't take orders from you anymore," Yzak said irritably. "Snake I might listen to, but you... And speaking of you, Snake," he added, "watch our backs for a minute, will you?"

Kevin grinned. "Will do, Tovarisch Commander."

Yzak's eyebrows went up at the appellation -his old captain had never called him "tovarisch" before- but he didn't let it distract him. "Commander Colde," he continued, "keep the rest of those GINNs off us, got it?"

"With pleasure, Commander Joule," Leona said coldly. "This... this is _personal."_

The silver-haired pilot winced. "I never would've believed it," he muttered. "There's _two_ of them!" He shook it off, and headed straight for the stolen prototypes. "C'mon, Dearka, Athrun! Let's finish this!"

"You got it," Dearka agreed, and unleashed a blast from his cannon straight at the Gaia. "Try this on for size, rookie!"

"That won't work," Stellar began. "You can't- Ah!" Her confident manner turned to sheer surprise as the red-orange beam tore through her back-mounted beam cannons, shattered them to melted wreckage. "How did you-? That _can't!"_

The blonde-haired pilot grinned. "Ha; haven't lost my touch after all!"

"Oh, be quiet, Dearka," Yzak snapped, but his heart wasn't in it, and he himself rushed the Abyss. "Time to show these idiots that newer doesn't mean better!"

Auel fired desperately, unleashing beam after beam from his remaining weapons, even charging and firing his chest-mounted multiphase energy cannon, but Yzak's Phantom was too swift, nimbly weaving through the scorching fire, and his beam axe was in his hand. Swinging it forward, he brought the weapon into a powerful slash at Abyss' legs, meeting momentary resistance but still stubbornly burning, melting, and cutting through the armored limbs, one after the other.

Its pilot cried out as his machine's legs exploded into shrapnel, the remnants speeding off into space on wildly divergent vectors. "That can't be!" Auel protested. "Not from a mass-produced unit!"

"Blast it," Sting muttered, seeing his two fellow knocked out of action. "Who _are_ these guys, anyway?" The contingent from _Minerva_ wasn't even bothering to attack now -except for one of the ZAKUs- as though this were a spectator sport, of all things!

Even as Athrun gazed speculatively at Chaos, calculating distances, velocities, and tactics, Leona's attention turned to the remaining GINNs. "I can't believe you used to be my comrades," she hissed at them. "How could you_ do_ this? What you're doing... it's just as monstrous as what Patrick Zala attempted two years ago!"

"People have forgotten our sacrifices, Leona," one of the pilots responded. "They forgot the path that Chairman Zala led us to, and they forgot _us._ Do you really want our sacrifice at Alaska to be forgotten? _Do you?"_

"Better to let all memory of us fade, Steve," she shot back, "than to have it forever tainted by an act as terrible as this! You know what I lost in Operation Spit Break, as do I, but I would rather have his memory be forgotten than have it linked with this kind of atrocity. You're dogs, all of you! We were once proud wolves, but you've sold your bodies and your souls, all in the name of vengeance!"

"I'm sorry you feel that way, Leona," the pilot who'd spoken said softly. "I guess that means _you're_ a wall in our path, too. So be it." The HM GINN raised its katana, while two of its fellows aimed beam rifles... and chaos erupted.

"If you think I'll let you do this, old friends, you're sadly mistaken!" Feeding more power to her ZAKU's verniers, Leona shot forward, allowing the twin emerald darts to streak harmlessly past. Twisting slightly to one side to dodge the first GINN's wicked slash, her spun around behind him, ignited her saber, and brought down in a flashing left-to-right downward diagonal strike, ripping through its wings and fuselage like a hot knife through butter. There was a chopped-off scream... and then silence, as the GINN exploded.

The other two redoubled their efforts to shoot her down, pumping out emerald energy as fast as their rifles could cycle, but she wove through it all, and hurled her saber in a spinning arc toward one of them, catching it in the waist. The twirling blade tore through, leaving the GINN's torso separated from its legs, and then it, too, erupted in flame and debris.

The final unit locked his targeting computer on Leona's ZAKU, firing desperately in an attempt to save his own life, and _his_ fire began to stitch a line across space that would inevitably intersect with her machine... and then an even larger emerald bolt came down from above, enveloped his upper torso, and blew him apart, the remains of the GINN vomiting flame into space.

"Looks like _that_ threat is over," Kevin said calmly, lowering his twin beam rifle. "You okay, tovarisch?"

Leona nodded, breathing deeply. "Oui, mon ami. Thanks for the assist." She gazed at the floating chunks of wreckage, and sighed. "I wish it hadn't ended like that, Kevin. Those men and women were all my friends, once upon a time. They deserved better."

"I know what you mean," he agreed. "Believe me, I know _exactly_ what you mean..." He glanced around the battlefield that this place had become. "I guess the only problem left is-"

Athrun moved.

Sting stared in utter disbelief as the ZAKU charged him, firing missiles from its backpack and brandishing a beam axe in one hand. "This can't be happening," he muttered, uncomprehending, as the mass-produced unit evaded all attempts by Chaos to blast him to cinders. "Not a ZAKU! It can't _do_ that-"

"Just get out of here!" Athrun shouted, and chopped down with the beam axe, its fiery blade biting into Chaos' beam rifle. "This is your last chance!"

The stolen machine hurriedly tossed aside the weapon moments before it could explode, and Sting threw Chaos around in a wrenching turn, before pumping energy into his thrusters in a frantic attempt to get clear. Chaos itself had taken very little damage, but he was now effectively unarmed.

Shinn stared in awe at the havoc the five pilots -all of whom were in mass-produced units- had wrought. "I don't believe it," he whispered. "Are the veterans of Jachin Due really that good...?"

"Jachin was a huge battle, Shinn," Luna reminded him. "Only the best survived it."

"I guess, but..." _But I never thought a mass-produced unit could _do_ that,_ Shinn finished silently to himself. _I thought Zala wasn't nearly as good as his reputation, but... even _Walker_ held his own out there. Is that what comes with experience?_

"There's no time for this, Shinn," Rey called, breaking into his thoughts. "We still have more work to do, remember. This isn't over yet."

Shinn shook himself. "Yeah. Yeah, let's go."

* * *

On _Minerva_'s Bridge, Cagalli tensely watched the battle, understanding many of the nuances from her own time on the frontlines yet missing others... particularly those in the exchanges between the pilots. "'The Fury'," she whispered, gazing speculatively at the steel-gray ZAKU. "What does that mean...?"

"It was her nickname two years ago," a soft voice said from behind her, and she turned in surprise to see black-haired Alec King standing at her shoulder, ostensibly checking some Bridge equipment. "It was at the Battle of Panama," he continued, "our grand counterattack after the Alliance's Alaska Cyclops trap. Most of her unit was killed by that Cyclops... so Leona Colde herself led the attack on Panama. It was..." He shrugged. "It was brutal. All her vengeful rage was unleashed with a cold fury in that battle, and she might've been one of the ancient Furies herself for all that the Earth Forces could blunt her advance. Even before the Gungnirs were deployed, she cut quite a bloody swath through them, and when the EMP _did_ go off..."

Cagalli frowned as the man trailed off. "So what happened then?" she whispered. "Did she...?"

Alec nodded. "That's right. She killed surrendering soldiers without a second thought, it was plain massacre; she even took pleasure in it, from the looks of things. She's regretted it ever since, or so they say, but... those kind of wounds go deep." His crimson eyes had taken on a faraway look, viewing battlefields past. "'War isn't all glory... it's all hell.' That's what William Tecumseh Sherman said, and he was right. I was there, Lady Cagalli, I saw the devastation that that one woman wrought. If you ever wonder why she gets along so well with Kevin, remember this: they've both seen the fires of hell for themselves, been reduced as utterly as any soldier can be. They share a pain that can never be understood without experiencing it for yourself; that's why, even now, I can't truly comprehend what Kevin went through, during and after the Project."

She nodded slowly. "I had no idea..."

"You still don't," he told her, "not really. But now you begin to understand. So understand something, please: you are very likely the only person in the world who can keep your friend in check... the only one who can save him from himself, if it comes to it."

Cagalli blinked. "But... I thought you wanted him dead...?"

Alec looked away. "I... I think I do," he said, almost inaudibly, "but... I don't know. And I _do_ know that my sister would want him to live on. So all I can do is ask you to take care of my old commander... because I can't do anything myself. Not until I know the truth, and believe it all the way through."

"I... I think I understand," she after a moment. "I'll do my best, er...?"

"Just call me Kyle," he advised. "Kevin's the only one who's kept to his true name, so maybe he's the only one who deserves to."

Cagalli's eyes widened. "The only one...? You mean, there are other...?" But Alec was gone, leaving her question unanswered.

A couple meters away, Meyrin blinked in surprise. "Captain, Bogey One is firing signal flares; the stolen units are now withdrawing!"

Durandal's eyebrows went up. "Indeed? I wonder if they believed our message, then; that would explain the sudden retreat."

"I doubt it," Gladys disagreed. "Under the circumstances, they're probably more concerned with entering Earth's gravity. Besides, our forces effectively knocked them out of the fight, anyway." She frowned. "But I wonder where that strike fighter came from. It was definitely an ABADDON design, so..."

"Probably this 'Hyperion' Baron Onishi mentioned," Durandal opined. "It seems Oracle's legacy has lived in after all."

"Junius Seven is breaking up," Burt Heim announced from the sensor station, interrupting their discussion. "The colony is breaking in two, with half slowing down; I think it'll achieve a stable orbit, Captain."

Gladys nodded almost absently. _But that still leaves the other half. There's no time to plant more meteor breakers, and the mobile suits simply don't have the firepower to do any good..._ "Chairman," she said over her shoulder, I suggest you transfer over to the _Voltaire._ Under the circumstances, I believe I have no choice but to bring _Minerva_ into the atmosphere, in an attempt to destroy what's left of the colony."

Durandal nodded slowly. "Agreed, Captain. I'll leave at once, then." He turned to Cagalli. "Lady Cagalli, will you accompany me to the _Voltaire?"_

She shook her head firmly. "No, Chairman. I'd rather stay here. My friends are still out there, and I _won't_ leave them behind. Besides," she added, "if I did, I wouldn't have any bodyguards, and I hope you'll forgive me if I say I'd rather not be in the PLANTs without them right now."

He nodded ruefully. "I can't say I'm pleased to hear that, Lady Cagalli, but you may be right; certainly your last visit didn't exactly go as planned." He walked to the Bridge hatch, and glanced over his shoulder. "Good luck, Captain."

"Thank you." Gladys turned to Meyrin. "Meyrin, signal our forces to return aboard at once. It looks like we've done our job."

"Yes, Ma'am."

Cagalli breathed out in relief. "So what's left, Captain?"

"Our mobile suits can't do any more good out there," Gladys explained to her. "That's why I ordered the recall. But there's still a sizable piece of the colony heading down, so we've still got work to do... and the only thing we've got that will do it is _Minerva_'s Tannhauser."

"But Kevin and the others won't have to be involved anymore?" the younger woman pressed.

"That's right. As I said, mobile suits can't do any more good out there." The Captain nodded at the display. "This should be the last direct involvement any of you will have in this situation, Lady Cagalli."

Cagalli sighed. "Good."

* * *

Shinn Asuka heaved a sigh of relief as he began to guide the Impulse back to _Minerva_'s waiting flight decks. Rey, Luna, and Leona had already returned -as Yzak and Dearka returned to their own ships- and he presumed Athrun and the Baron were just behind him. _It's almost over,_ he thought, tired but satisfied. _A little longer, and... Wait a second._

He glanced at his rear display, and frowned. There was no sign of either Athrun's ZAKU or the Sturm Vogel, which was certainly odd, in light of who the pilots were. _I'd better find them,_ he decided. _That Baron's not entirely useless after all, and besides, the last thing we need is a diplomatic incident with Orb because we misplaced a noble and a bodyguard..._

Not yet bothering to inform _Minerva,_ Shinn brought the Impulse around, and boosted off toward the remains of Junius Seven again. If they weren't in plain sight, they had to be there, though he couldn't for the life of him imagine why.

As he approached, he caught the edge of transmission between the two wayward pilots, and homed in on it. "...could launch a missile strike against it, Alex, but I'm not sure it would work."

"What are you talking about?" Athrun's voice demanded. "Missile strike? From _what?"_

"There's a few things about my mansion you obviously haven't gotten around to learning yet," Kevin said dryly. "Cagalli knows, of course, though I doubt even she realizes how many of the systems are functional. But there's an old military-"

"What are you two _doing?"_ Shinn demanded, finding them at last, next to an inactive meteor breaker. "Didn't you hear the recall order?"

"Not much choice, Shinn," Athrun told him, motioning at the meteor breaker. "We need to get this thing active before we leave, so..."

"Right," the black-haired pilot said in sudden understanding. "Okay, let's do it. Guess you're not _all_ bad after all, Baron," he added as an aside. "Not that I _like_ you or anything, but I guess you've got some good points."

"Even my enemies usually respect me, Asuka," Kevin said, voice still dry. "Mostly because they know how easy it would be for me to kill them. That kind of lethal potential usually gets respect even from the most jaded terrorist or dictator."

"Yeah..." As they labored on the device, Shinn glanced at the ZAKU. "So... what _are_ you doing with Orb, Ath- Alex?" That was something that had been bothering him ever since he first learned of "Alex Dino's" true identity.

Athrun paused for several moments, trying to decide how to respond. _Because all my friends are there... or most of them, anyway,_ he thought. _Because Kevin could do a better job of getting me a new identity than almost anyone else. Because... I have too many reasons, really._ He opened his mouth to speak... and emerald fire flashed by his cockpit. "What the-"

"More NGSF troops," Kevin said grimly, spinning to face the High Maneuver GINNs. "Nichevo; guess we didn't get all of them."

"You forgot about _me,_ Hydra," Sato mocked, coming toward them along with two of his subordinates. "I told you that you couldn't finish what you started!"

"Solkin syn," Kevin cursed. "Athrun, hold him off for a sec; Shinn, help me take care of the others."

Shinn nodded. "Roger that, Baron." Together, Impulse and the Sturm Vogel rushed Sato's companions, rifles in hand.

Athrun was left to deal with Sato, and he lifted his own rifle. "Why are you doing this?" he demanded, spitting an emerald dart at the renegade. "This should've been over two years ago!"

"You just don't get it, do you... Athrun Zala?" Sato sneered. "You people have all forgotten the past, the sins of the last war... the victims of the Bloody Valentine. _Both_ sides have forgotten, and ZAFT is nothing but a weak revenant of the force it once was! The only way to remind of the world of what happened, to make sure this terrible day is never forgotten, is to drop this ruined colony onto Earth itself. Remind of them of their own sins, and punish them for it in the same blow! Patrick Zala was the one who had the right idea; _his_ policies were leading to the future for us all!"

Athrun, starting to fire again, froze, remembering the past that he, unlike Sato, had seen with his own eyes. That terrible day at Jachin Due, nuclear explosions going off all around, _Dominion_'s Strike Daggers picked off one by one... and the confrontation inside Jachin itself. _"Eye for an eye... tooth for a tooth... life for a life..."_ The bright flash of plasma fire that immolated his father, and then the rush to GENESIS, wherein Kevin Walker had sacrificed his life to stop the end of the world...

"You pathetic worm," Sato snarled, bringing his sword down on the ZAKU's forearm. "So shocked you can't even fight back? You really _are_ worthless!" There was a shock as metal met metal, then the ZAKU's right arm and beam rifle drifted free, and Sato's GINN clamped a hand on Athrun's leg. "We're going down together, you and I," he whispered. "You, too, will perish here... and I'll see my daughter again at last."

Impulse snapped off a shot from its rifle, and the emerald dart pierced the center of its target, triggering a chain reaction that blew it apart. At the same moment, the Sturm Vogel's twin rifle unleashed a bolt of emerald fire, engulfing the other GINN in actinic flame. "They're down," Kevin muttered in satisfaction. "One left..."

"Oblivion comes..." Sato whispered... and Shinn saw Athrun's predicament, yanked out a beam saber, and slashed the blade of frozen fire through the ZAKU's leg, severing it and forcing Sato away.

A heartbeat later, the Sturm Vogel slammed into the GINN High Maneuver, forcing them both toward the colony itself. "I told you that you wouldn't survive this day!" Kevin told Sato, even as he fell back, the heat of reentry bathing his whole machine in red light. "This isn't over yet!"

"Wrong, Hydra," Sato rasped. "You've just sealed your own doom, and nothing can stop this section of Junius Seven now..."

"We'll see about that," Kevin Walker shot back, and relaxed the mental block that kept his automatic protocols in check. Instantly, his internal drug reservoir flooded his body with stimulants and reaction-enhancing drugs... and his left hand settled on an adaptor he'd attacked to the Sturm Vogel's computer earlier in the fight. The neural receptor beneath the skin of his palm made contact with the interface, and his own neural connections were rerouted, directed instead into the systems of the mobile suit. As soon as contact was established, his mind dove into the system, ruthlessly ripping away safety systems, and altering the power settings on the twin beam rifle, bringing them to a level not seen since MBF-M1000 Sturm Falke was shattered at Jachin Due. "I've still got one card yet to play!"

The twin rifle snapped into firing position, aiming at Sato and the colony behind him, and the muzzle began to glow...

* * *

Author's note: Junius Seven is falling, and though _Minerva_ and her pilots have successfully blunted the attack, it has not been stopped. Now the lives of three pilots and a world hang in the balance, as _Minerva_, and one unique mobile suit, strive to stem the tide...

Okay, I know, this chapter took a while, but as should be obvious, it was a rather long one. I'm going to try to do something about that -long chapters are good, but I'd rather have shorter ones if it means I can update a little more often- but for now, here's the latest one. Not sure how it turned out, really, but I'll let you people decide.

I should mention here that the flashback at the beginning of the chapter is not my work; arekuruu-inabikari-no-She kindly contributed that bit of Leona's backstory.

Oh, yeah: tomorrow I'll be making a couple of sizable edits to Chapter 5, so don't be surprised if you see a few things changed. Several errors were brought to my attention, and they'll soon be corrected. In the meantime, though, please let me know how _this_ chapter was. -Solid Shark


	7. Chapter 7: Ruined Earth

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, and Frank Castile

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"It's a truism that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Everyone knows that; but unfortunately, not everyone realizes that lesser power will also corrupt, even if only by the same lesser percentage. And when that corruption is left unchecked, it can lead to a desire for more power... which _will_ corrupt absolutely._

_"I've known several people now who've turned down that path. Patrick Zala began as a genuine patriot, helping to organize the PLANTs into a unity that could stand up for its own rights. He became the leader of the reorganized Zodiac Alliance of Freedom Treaty following the Mandelbrot Incident, and worked as hard as anyone to achieve a peaceful solution, and he was, as near as I can tell, content with his position, even with the atrocity he authorized, the one called ABADDON. But then his wife was killed, and he began to hunger for more power. He rationalized it, of course, saying that _he_ knew best how to deal with the Earth Forces, but in the end it all came down to vengeance... and power._

_"Then there was Commander Jeffrey Harris, codename Oracle. Once an unstable yet merely smalltime scientist, his chance came when Rau Le Creuset gave him the chance to put his theories into practice. Then when those theories began to come to fruition, producing those like me, the ultimate soldiers, he began to hunger for more. He even made a deal with Blue Cosmos, loaning me to them in a mission to the Mendel Colony, in an attempt to provoke a war that could propel him to greater heights of power. Had I not killed him, he might have succeeded._

_"And, at the beginning of it all, there was my father. A pity it is that no one, not even I, realized his true intent before it was too late. My mother Irena never had any suspicion, and even Lord Uzumi never guessed at the truth of John Tyler Onishi's treachery. If we had, perhaps we might've understood sooner _why _I was created, and why a killing virus was left within me as a failsafe. But no, we didn't know, and it was almost too late before we made the breakthrough, found the final, hidden files that unveiled my father's terrible plan._

_"Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony. Once, a young woman had, in her ignorance, given the key to the door that would end the war in nuclear fire to one of mankind's worst enemies; a man whose hatred, matched by that of his counterpart, nearly destroyed the world. This time, that same woman was the only one who held the keys to the truth that would save my life, and stop the insidious plans of the bastard called my father. Had Flay Allster not passed through the fire and become a soldier, I would not today be alive..."_

Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_Hyperion gazed around the laboratory, and shuddered in revulsion. "I had no idea," the soldier whispered, gazing at the torture rack, the racks of mind-altering chemicals... the blood-soaked floor. Some of it was from the corpse still pinned to the torture device by a sharpened metal fragment, but most of it was older than that... and from Hyperion's cursory scan, it matched Kevin Walker's unique blood type._

_All of it looked exactly the way it had when the massacre happened, over six months before. The thermonuclear device had been far smaller than what ZAFT had ordered Oracle to use, but it had sufficed to knock out life support throughout much of the facility. Instantly, this place had frozen, and Erica Hawke looked much as she had the day she died._

_"I'm sorry, my friends," Hyperion whispered. "If only we hadn't been so gullible..." The soldier's head shook, and Hyperion stepped back out of the room, where the helm of the spacesuit could be safely removed._

_Hyperion had come here for more than one reason. To say goodbye to the past, much as the soldier had said goodbye to Mike... and to prepare for the future. With the team scattered or dead, Hyperion had but one goal left: defend the unit's commander. They had been too blind to see what was wrong before, and paid the price; now one soldier who had renounced all trace of prior identity would make up for that failure._

_Moving to a computer terminal in one of the habitable sections of the facility, Hyperion placed a hand against the neural interface, putting the receptor beneath the skin of the palm in contact with the terminal's access. Immediately, data began to stream behind the soldier's eyes; data of weaponry, devices which had been designed before the Project's end but never actually built. The first was a Mark V Destroyer battlesuit, which Hyperion had already constructed with the lab's manufacturing equipment. That would be the soldier's sword against Kevin Walker's enemies, and a shield between the world and Hyperion's true identity. But the next... that would be the soldier's transport, and a sword to be used should the battles be carried to the skies or even to the black of space itself._

_ADFX-01 Apollyon. The name was Greek for Destroyer, just as "ABADDON" meant the same thing in Hebrew. During flight simulator training, the Destroyers themselves had called it Excalibur, for its weapons could cut through even ZAFT's GINNs, or the toughest, most maneuverable mobile armors Earth had. Armed with twin twenty-centimeter "Valkyrie" plasma cannons in the roots of the swing wings, a pair of fifteen-millimeter "Charon" laser cannons on either side of the cockpit, a single thirty-millimeter "Garm" multiphase energy cannon in the nose, and eight "Harbinger" anti-mobile weapon missiles in twin internal ordnance bays, the Excalibur strike fighter was a lethal machine; though the energy weapons were of seemingly small size, they were powered by a fusion reactor under optimal conditions, and fission when reactor mass became an issue, rendering them far powerful than any weapon their size had any right to be._

_Coupled with laminated armor, radar-absorbing and infrared-damping coating, optical camouflage, and powerful engines capable of reaching Mach 25 in space and Mach 15 in atmosphere, it was fast, maneuverable, and lethal, as well as being almost impossible to destroy with the few weapons that could catch it._

_"A fitting weapon with which to protect Kevin," Hyperion murmured. "Fast, invisible... unstoppable..."_

_Now it was time for the soldier to begin preparations anew; the months with Mike had dusted off the old skills, but more practice would be needed before Hyperion was truly battle-ready. Practice in the old skills... and the new, with the battlesuit and the Excalibur, once it was constructed. And this time, Hyperion swore everything would happen as it should; the mistakes of the past had already cost the lives of too many of the soldier's teammates, the innocence -and, at least briefly, mind- of Kevin Walker, and the sanity of Michael Carnehan._

_This time, it would _not_ all be in vain!_

* * *

Flay worked quickly on the control panel in the security center of Carter's base. So far, she'd accounted for three of the clones that were now roaming the installation, and with each one, the risk of being found by larger numbers grew. _I have to get out of here, fast,_ she thought. _But first, I need to find out all I can, so that Kevin can stop whatever's happening..._

She was not a hacker, unfortunately -the lessons Kevin had given her mainly concerned combat- but she did have one priceless advantage here: not even Carter had been paranoid enough to imagine that someone might get access to the security nerve center of the base, which meant this one panel could access just about everything in the facility's database. By now, she was midway into a download of genetic research, and had already copied a number of encrypted files onto portable storage.

A beep sounded from the panel, signaling completion of the download, and Flay pulled out the last disc. "Time to go," she whispered, "before something worse happens..."

Tucking the disc into a pocket of her flightsuit, she picked up her stolen pistol and moved to the hatch. Keying it open, she carefully looked to either side, before stepping out into the corridor and running lightly along it. Back in the security center, she'd checked a schematic to refresh her memory of the hangar's location, and now she headed that way as fast as her legs would carry her.

That speed was all that saved Flay's life, when a hail of bullets erupted from a side corridor as she passed. "Halt!" a familiar yet strange voice called. "Throw down your weapon, now!"

Flay slid to a stop against the bulkhead next to the side corridor. "You don't think I'll actually do it, do you?" she shouted back at the clone. "You'll just kill me anyway!"

"Maybe so, but it would've been quicker!" There was the ominous sound of a pin being removed from something, and then a clang as a handle sprang free of the same object, and a grenade came bouncing toward her position.

Her eyes widened at the sight. _Are they _crazy?_ Using that in here-!_ Her foot darted out, connected with the grenade, and sent it flying back the way it had come. "Try that!"

"Oh, sh-!" The expletive cut off as the grenade exploded right on schedule, turning briefly into a scream, and a splattering noise.

Flay took one look around the corner, grimaced, and took off running along her original course. "Yuck," she commented under her breath. "That just wasn't right at all..."

All the same, despite having successfully killed four clones so far, she knew that it was only their inexperience and deliberately-limited intellect which had allowed her to survive this far. Had she been up against the real Kevin Walker, or even Jack Carter, she wouldn't have survived beyond the first attack in her quarters. _But against these guys, I have a chance..._

Flay could hear booted feet pounding along the corridor in pursuit now, and knew it had become a race. If she reached the mobile suit hangar before they did, she would have a chance of escaping. If they got there first...

* * *

The firs of reentry were licking at the remaining half of Junius Seven now, as they also touched the ship chasing it. Wings spread, bow-mounted cannon deployed, _Minerva_ followed the wrecked colony into the atmosphere, determined to complete her mission against all odds.

Heeling over to starboard, the ship dove after the falling ruins, and a column of antimatter blasted out from the Tannhauser's muzzle, reaching out to the colony remains. In the collision of forces, the energy released was titanic, producing an explosion that further chipped away at the target's integrity.

On _Minerva_'s Bridge, Meyrin glanced worriedly at her captain. "I can't confirm the locations of Shinn, Alex, or Baron Onishi, Ma'am," she said, concerned. "That means..."

Gladys nodded sharply, knowing exactly what her subordinate was talking about. "I know, Meyrin," she said quietly, "but we have no choice. That debris _must_ be stopped, no matter what the cost. We have to do _something, _even if it means taking this risk."

"That idiot," Leona muttered, coming onto the Bridge. "What was he _thinking,_ anyway, staying out there? He should've come back with the rest of us..."

Beside her, Cagalli swallowed. "They'll both be fine, Leona," she said quietly. "They have to be. Alex is too good a pilot, and Kevin... Kevin always comes-"

Near the exact center of the remaining colony half, an enormous red-orange beam blasted all the way through, stretching out into deep space and pushing the rapidly-disintegrating remains of a GINN High Maneuver Mark II ahead of it. Clearly originating from _below_ the colony, it showed something down there was still active.

"What _was_ that?" Trine blurted. "None of our machines-"

"It must've been the Sturm Vogel," Gladys informed him. "I don't know all the details, but I do know it was originally intended to be more capable than its completed form turned out to be. If I had to guess, the Baron figured out how to exploit its potential, probably by directing most of his remaining power into the twin rifle."

Cagalli sighed in audible relief. "Then he's still alive... and if he is, so is Alex." _I knew it, Kevin! I _knew_ you'd stay alive!_

Gladys nodded absently, but she didn't quite share the Chief Representative's optimism. Yes, that blast showed Kevin was still alive... but she'd omitted in her explanation to Cagalli one crucial fact. _He must've almost _completely _drained his power to pull that off,_ she thought unhappily. _If he has any left at all... Well, I don't expect _that_ man has any worries about surviving reentry, but I highly doubt he has the maneuvering capacity left to make a controlled landing._

"Continue firing on the colony," she said after a moment. "Fire Tannhauser as fast as possible, Chen; not the minimum delay allowed, the minimum _possible._ I don't care if it overheats, we have to stop that thing from hitting the planet."

"Understood, Captain!"

"There's nothing to worry about," Leona murmured to Cagalli. "Those two are excellent soldiers; and Kevin, at least, has been through independent atmospheric reentry before, remember. They'll be fine."

The younger woman nodded slowly. "Yeah, you're right..."

* * *

Within the cockpit of ZGMF-X56S Impulse, Shinn Asuka shook his head groggily, focused his eyes on his forward display, and twitched his controls to adjust his angle of descent. The enormous blast that had erupted from the Sturm Vogel had knocked him for a loop, and in the process he'd lost track of the Baron's machine and Athrun's ZAKU.

Now that his own machine was in a position more compatible with _not_ burning up on the way down, he could take the time to look for his comrades. _They should still be nearby,_ he thought, _if they managed to survive... whatever it was that Walker did. If I can just find them..._

Glancing about, Shinn almost immediately caught sight of the Sturm Vogel's distinctive shape. It had apparently assumed an angle more appropriate to atmospheric reentry, but its thrusters were no longer firing... and chunks of its armor were being ripped away by the friction heat from its descent. "Walker!" he called. "Are you okay over there?"

Kevin's helmeted visage appeared on his display. "Kind of," he responded, wincing. "Used up most of my power firing that last shot, though... and spent the rest of it making sure I didn't instantly die. Now I find out that it wasn't quite ready for a crash descent like this -I'm losing parts like crazy- and if I don't figure out something fast, I'm in for a hard landing."

Shinn winced. "And Alex? Do you see him anywhere?"

"No," the Baron replied grimly. "Last I saw of him, he was going for a loop thanks to my blowing up Sato... Just a second." He closed his eyes -which, Shinn noted, seemed even brighter than usual- and appeared to concentrate for several moments.

_What is he doing?_ the black-haired pilot wondered. _Trying to use his "sixth sense" to find him? I'd say that sounds crazy, except..._ Except that he'd seen him literally block an attack from the Gaia with his eyes closed, and he -and Leona Colde- had been the first to note the appearance of the stolen mobile suits during the battle in orbit.

After a few moments, Kevin opened his eyes, and glanced off to his right. "He's over that way," he said definitively. "See what you can do for him, okay?"

"What about you?"

The Baron half-smiled. "Come on, Shinn, don't tell me you really care what happens to me. Anyway, he's probably in more trouble than I am. Go."

Shinn didn't hesitate further. "Roger that, Walker." Giving the older pilot a brief but sincere salute, he fed energy into his thrusters, slowly slipping past the Sturm Vogel.

Because of that motion, he never noticed the black shape that came down from above.

* * *

"This is bad," a brown-haired woman with gray eyes commented softly. "Look at it all..."

"I know," a one-eyed, brown-haired man with a walking stick agreed. "I never thought it would actually come to this, you know; not after GENESIS was thwarted two years ago."

"It may've been inevitable," another woman, just as brown-haired as her companions but with more reddish eyes, said thoughtfully. "I know Kevin looked into this possibility, after taking over Morgenroete. He always predicted the war wasn't over, remember."

"True enough," Andrew Waltfeld agreed with a sigh. "Racher usually _is_ right, in the end."

He, along with Meryl Steiglitz and Murrue Ramius, stood within a sophisticated command center, from which they observed the falling wreckage from Junius Seven as it collided with the Earth. The center itself was buried beneath the massive edifice known as the Onishi Mansion; what most people, even some of its inhabitants, failed to realize was that most of the mansion's bulk was actually underground, in a military base that dwarfed the habitation above it. Originally established during the Reconstruction War, the Onishi family had, generations before, chosen to refurbish it, building their family estate atop it for easy access.

Much of the weapons stockpiled within were decades out of date, but the command and control systems had been regularly updated by each generation of the Onishi family. For that matter, so had much of the weaponry, as the once-empty facilities were filled with hand weapons, explosives, heavy armament, and vehicles of all types. Much of it was antique, recovered from bases of similar -or even greater- antiquity, but some of it was brand new, with certain recent additions being, like the C&C systems, better than anything found on the open market or even in most militaries.

Meryl closed her eyes in sorrow. _"Look _at it all," she whispered. "ZAFT did their job well, but it wasn't enough. So much is going to reach the surface anyway..."

_"It already is,"_ a speaker said, as a face appeared on one of the screens. _"I'm linked into the Artemis arrays right now, and I can tell you it's not pretty."_

"What's the situation, Max?" Murrue asked of the AI. "What's your estimate of the damage... and where are Kevin and the _Minerva?"_

_"Damage is bad,"_ Max said flatly. _"Pieces are still coming down, but Artemis has already confirmed the total loss of Rome and The Vatican, as well as the Parthenon in Athens. A lot of ocean hits, too, which are bound to cause tidal effects -tsunamis, probably lots of them- and, with that much debris entering the upper atmosphere, climatic changes are likely."_

Andy nodded somberly. "It's just like Morgenroete's study predicted, isn't it?"

_"I'm afraid so. It's... oh, man, it's bad."_ The AI appeared to swallow. _"Some of the wreckage is still in the upper atmosphere, being blasted by the _Minerva,_ but the damage that's already been done is terrible. Millions dead now, from Rome and Athens alone; you'll probably see tsunamis heading your way before long. It's a good thing Orb's rugged territory."_

"Agreed," Murrue said quietly. "I already had Lacus move the children into the shelter, just in case. What about Kevin?" she went on. "If I know him, there's no way he'd stay out of this."

_"He didn't. Neither did Athrun, as it happens, and I think he's a little worse off; Impulse is heading for him right now, though. Anyway, _Minerva_ is somewhere above me right now -I'm deployed in the Morgan at the moment- and I'm descending to Kevin's altitude now. He's flying the Sturm Vogel prototype ZAFT built a couple years back, and it looks like he figured out how to fire a full-power buster rifle shot from its twin beam rifle, or so I judge from a big explosion a few minutes ago and the fact that he's completely out of power right now."_

"Is there anything you can do?" Andy asked. "I doubt even Racher could survive the kind of landing you're implying."

_"I'm gonna try to give him a jumpstart,"_ Max replied. _"Morgan is nuclear-powered; I can spare the juice. Still... is there anything you can do on _your_ end?"_

Meryl frowned. "I doubt it," she said slowly. "I could probably fly Nemesis if I had to, but Kevin's the only one who really knows how to keep that thing from blowing up. We don't have any of the mass-produced units down here, either... and I doubt the Captain would authorize their use right now anyway. You know how careful he's being with information right now."

_"Yeah."_ The AI's image grimaced. _"Well, I'll do my best. Max, out."_

Andy sighed. "I guess there's nothing we can do, then," he said quietly. "This place has more firepower than some countries, but the only thing here that could take that out without making things worse can only be used by Racher, and even if he were here..."

Murrue nodded. "Who knows if he'd _use_ it. I can understand, though, why Cagalli insisted that he retire. He's had too many close calls -as this incident proves- and he really does need the rest. How many years did he spend on the battlefield?"

"Call it three," he replied, "when you leave out his time at Heliopolis. You're right... though not for the reason you're probably thinking."

Meryl raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean, Andy? I'd think it's just combat fatigue; too much time on the frontlines..."

"Racher doesn't suffer from combat fatigue," Andy said bluntly. "I checked his psych profile after Zala assigned me to _Eternal._ He's one of those people who can stay on the sharp end indefinitely. No, the problem isn't the battles... it's what he's done _off_ the battlefield."

Murrue's gaze sharpened. "You mean ABADDON's end."

He nodded. "There were a few other things, but yes, that was the biggest issue. You know he was neurotic between ABADDON and _Archangel_'s arrival on Earth, two years ago... but what you _don't_ know -because only Aisha and I ever knew, because it happened while he was staying with us- is that four years ago, Racher nearly blew his own head off."

She gasped. "He... almost suicided? I knew him to be somewhat schizophrenic during those early days on the _Archangel,_ but..."

"I managed to talk him out of it, back then," Andy told her, closing his eye as he reflected on the past. "I didn't know what was going on -that was before I knew he had anything to do with ABADDON- but I knew what I was looking at when I walked into his room late one night, and saw him holding a pistol. He said the name Rachel, then something in Russian, and then said something else in Russian as he put the pistol to his chin; I later found out what he'd said was 'Forgive me'," he explained, "but even then I knew it wasn't good. So I walked in there, and I snapped at him. 'Killing yourself won't solve anything,' I told him. 'Whatever you did, blowing your own brains out won't make it right. If it's redemption you want, you can only achieve it by living on, because you won't have a chance to undo _anything_ if you're dead.'"

Murrue shook her head. "And here I'd thought I saw the worst of his depression when he first came aboard_ Archangel..._ So if it weren't for you, he might be dead now?"

Andy shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not. I _think_ he would've gone through with it, but I'm not sure... and I'm even less sure that he would've _stayed_ dead. Anyway, Aisha wasn't really surprised when I told her about what he almost did... or the fact that I managed to convince him not to. She said something about him still having a role to play, and called him 'The avenging angel of the skies'." He smiled with an edge of sadness as he remember the woman he'd loved. "She was right about that..."

"That's true," Meryl agreed. "He really is like the Angel of Death; as far as ZAFT and the Earth Forces are concerned, the Captain is the Bogeyman."

"When you can tear apart main battle tanks with your bare hands," Murrue said dryly, "you tend to give that impression. And my brother certainly has never been very interested in hiding his reputation. He may pretend to be someone else, but when he _is_ admitting who he is, he seems to take pride in his history of violence."

"Psych warfare," Andy explained. "Sometimes, a man can be more dangerous than he really is simply because people _think_ he is. Now, Racher is every bit as good as the stories say -the three of us all know that firsthand- but that kind of rep can also prevent a fight from starting, if the other guy thinks he's going to lose no matter what." He motioned toward the door. "Now, we'd better get topside, before Kira starts wondering where we are. Racher still doesn't want him to know about this place, remember?"

Murrue nodded. "Quite; just as he still won't admit to anyone the extent of his weapons research... or the fact that he's dying."

* * *

Kevin glanced up at the sky above his plummeting Sturm Vogel, and felt a twinge of relief as he saw the black mobile suit that descended toward him. "You have no idea how glad I am to see you, Max," he said sincerely. "It was getting a bit lonely out here."

"I'm sure," the AI said dryly from the Morgan's computers. The machine itself was a matte black, made of the same radar-absorbent alloy as the Sturm Falke, and equipped with a mobile armor mode, which it was currently using to keep pace with the Sturm Vogel. Armed only with a heat rod -the design experimental, developed partly by Artemis and partly through stolen ZAFT designs- and a powerful beam sword, it was something that could be flown properly only by those with superb reflexes and fast thinking, in order to close the range to an enemy enough to use the weapons. Since its assigned pilot was a sentient computer program, however, that was hardly an issue.

Another thing about the Morgan was that it had no model number. It had only a codename, because even among Kevin's Artemis forces, it didn't officially exist. It was his hedge against the possibility of the operation becoming common knowledge; if even _Prometheus, Icarus,_ Nemesis, and Foxhound were exposed, Kevin still had a confidential agent who could carry out his orders completely in the black.

Not that he expected his machinations to be accidentally discovered anytime soon. Artemis was officially destroyed -as well as hidden by the best stealth technology he had at his disposal- and the only incriminating evidence within easy reach lay beneath his mansion... and of those who both knew of the base's existence and had access to it, only Cagalli was unaware of the presence of Nemesis, and she hadn't been down there in years. The only real danger was the possibility of Kira stumbling on the base's entrance, which, fortunately, seemed unlikely.

"So," Max went on after a moment, "what can I do for you, Cap'n?"

"You can start by slowing my descent a little," Kevin replied, "and telling me just what's going on. I know we didn't get it all, even with things still going bang up there-" indeed, positron streams continued to bite into the rapidly-vanishing debris "-so I'd like to at least get a start on hearing the bad news."

"Roger that." The AI paused as though to collect her thoughts; a mannerism that was unnecessary, considering her nature, but nonetheless an affection human she interacted with tended to appreciate. "First of all, the Artemis surveillance arrays have seen a lot of hits in coastal areas, and a couple of major cities..."

* * *

On _Girty_ _Lue's_ Bridge, in orbit, Neo Roanoke gazed pensively at the display showing the devastation the falling colony wrought upon the world. "So it begins," he murmured. "The seeds of a new war, sown by the Coordinators themselves... How tragic."

"They didn't succeed in stopping the colony drop," Ian Lee remarked, awestruck by the destruction. "Did we go too far, delaying them that way...?"

Neo shook his head. "They may not have succeeded, but they didn't entirely fail, either; otherwise, this would be a lot worse. That means we've succeeded in _our_ mission, Ian; I think our superiors will be pleased. The loss of life is tragic, but it's a means to an end."

Lee nodded reluctantly. "What about the secondary objective? Do you think Walker died there, Captain?"

The masked captain shook his head again. "Not likely, Ian. The Crimson Tiger is tenacious, clever, and durable; and from all reports, he also has an annoying habit of coming back from the dead. No, he'll be back... and this incident may have been counterproductive, as far as our dealings with him are concerned. If this spurs him to reclaim his old position as our worst enemy, I have no doubt he'll be a formidable adversary."

"You sound like you're speaking from personal experience, Captain," the lieutenant commander remarked.

"Partly," Neo acknowledged. "He was still good enough during the chase following Armory One that he fought me to a standstill, and from subsequent research into our admittedly sketchy records of him, I say I got off lucky. If he'd been smart enough to rebuild Stormhawk and have it waiting for him, he could've obliterated me _and_ the ship with a single shot. And on the ground..." He shrugged. "Remember Groom Lake, Ian -where he wiped out a Blue Cosmos unit despite being outnumbered a hundred to one- and Jachin Due, where he finally succeeded in eliminating Azrael. He's an implacable foe, that one."

Lee nodded pensively, and gazed again at the image of Earth. "You really think our orders to intervene here were a mistake, then, Sir?"

"Not entirely," the captain disputed. "Oh, it may've brought back one of our worst enemies, but when you get right down to it, he's only one man. Even Kevin Walker can only be in one place at a time. The overriding concern is that Earth was damaged, but not enough to cripple us, which means that this, along with certain other incidents I'm getting reports of, should be enough to 'justify' the actions I believe our superiors intend to take." He nodded at the display. "As I said, the seeds of the new war have been sown."

_And where we go from here,_ Neo thought to himself, _is a choice I leave to you._

* * *

As the last remnants of Junius Seven disappeared from their targeting systems, the _Minerva_'s crew began to relax... slightly. The ordeal of fast, violent atmospheric reentry was over, but three of their machines were still unaccounted for...

"Do you think it was enough, Captain?" Cagalli asked quietly. "Did we stop it?"

Gladys sighed. "Not entirely," she replied, voice equally soft. "We undoubtedly lessened its impact, but we know a lot of it got through anyway. All we can hope for is that the damage isn't irreparable." She turned to the sensor station. "Burt, begin scanning for our missing machines. We have to find them before whatever power they have left fails completely."

"Yes, Ma'am."

Trine looked over at her. "Do you really think they survived that, Captain?" he asked quietly. "The way we were firing, along with the rough reentry..."

"All we can do is hope," Gladys replied. "Even with our random firing of the Tannhauser, however, it's my belief that the odds are in their favor. I'm _certain_ the Baron, at least, managed to avoid at least the beginning of it -that shot of his proves that- and I believe he was entirely capable of avoiding the rest. And Shinn and Alex... All we can do is hope, Arthur."

"They'll be alive," Cagalli whispered to herself. "If they survived Jachin, they could survive what just happened..."

* * *

Athrun gazed out his forward display, and knew, with absolute certainty, that unless a new factor entered the equation he was going to die.

Or at least be severely injured, he amended to himself. He _was_ heading for a water landing, after all... for all the good it would do him. Unlike the Sturm Vogel, he was not only low on power, but also missing various crucial parts. His ZAKU's verniers were gone, and although they couldn't have _stopped_ his fall, it would've been comforting to at least have a way of _slowing_ it.

He rather suspected that Kevin wasn't having that problem; the Sturm Vogel's wings were allowing it to glide, and he'd caught sight of the black shape that descended toward the falling machine. Athrun had no idea what it was, but he had a shrewd feeling that Kevin himself had somehow arranged it.

_I did wonder,_ Athrun thought, _why Kevin gave in so easily when Cagalli had him decommission all that hardware. Now I guess I know. He's been carrying on as before... just without telling anybody about it. Not,_ his mind insisted on adding dryly, _that it helps _me_ any right now._

He was actually reasonably relaxed, but that was mostly because there was absolutely nothing he could do to change his current situation. If death was coming anyway, there was no point fretting about it; he now began to understand one reason Kevin was always so calm before his deaths.

Of course, that didn't mean he wasn't also scared out of his wits.

Then the ZAKU's radio starting talking to him. "Alex, do you read me? Alex, is your radio still working?"

Athrun looked up, and blinked as he saw the Impulse approaching him. "Shinn? Yeah, I'm here; but you should get away. There's nothing you can do."

Shinn snorted. "You think I'm just going to leave it at that? I'm not leaving you behind to die, 'Alex'. I'm getting you back to the _Minerva."_

Athrun shook his head. "Don't be an idiot," he retorted. "My machine is going to pieces, I have no thrusters, and as powerful as the Force silhouette's thrusters are, there's no way you can keep yourself flying while carrying my extra weight."

"There's a lot less of you than there used to be," the younger pilot pointed out, grabbing hold of the wrecked ZAKU. "Impulse can handle the strain, don't worry."

True to his word -and rather to Athrun's surprise- Impulse carried the weight without much difficulty. They _were_ gradually losing altitude, but for the moment it was at a manageable rate. "Thanks," he told Shinn.

"Don't mention it." The black-haired pilot glanced around. "Next question: where's Walker gotten himself to? After that blast he fired on the way down, he must be about out of power by now, and he can't glide forever."

Athrun looked at him curiously. "What do _you_ care, Shinn? I thought you hated his guts."

"I don't like him," Shinn freely admitted, "but he just helped us out, and nearly got incinerated in the process. I'm not about to let him just die after that. Besides," he quipped, "Luna won't be happy if he crashes before she can decide if she wants to kill him herself or not."

"You may be right about that," Athrun said with a wince, remembering the... history between Kevin and the Hawke sisters. He still didn't know much about the actual event -he rather suspected, though, that Kevin remembered more about it than he was prepared to admit- but he knew it had been bad. "Well, in that case, I think he's over that way," he said, turning the ZAKU's head toward where he'd seen the Sturm Vogel earlier.

Shinn nodded. "Okay, let's go."

"... and that's how it looks so far, Captain," Max was saying to Kevin. "The world took a nasty- Wait a second, Boss; Impulse is heading this way."

Kevin's head snapped to his right, and his eyes narrowed fractionally. "I see him; looks like he found Athrun, too. Okay, Max, go stealth for now, get clear, and head for the mansion. Remember, as far as Kira's concerned, you arrived via datalink from Morgenroete, got it?"

The AI nodded, smiling. "Got it." Kira, like Cagalli, was unaware of the activities at the Artemis base, and Kevin preferred to keep it that way. Therefore, to explain Max's frequent absences, the usual story was that she was involved in design work at Morgenroete... which was at least partly true, since most of Kevin's construction people at Artemis were drawn from Morgenroete in the first place.

The Morgan vanished, as per instructions, and by the time Impulse arrived, Kevin was quite alone... and interested in seeing exactly what Shinn intended to do about the situation. _He can't lift me _and_ what's left of the ZAKU,_ he reasoned, _so perhaps he's decided to come kill me._ He shrugged inwardly. _Not, I suppose, that I'd entirely blame him. After what I did, however it transpired, he'd simply be doing the same thing I've done so many times over the years. Of course,_ the Baron amended to himself, _I never avenged _accidents._ Only deliberate acts..._

"You still alive over there, Walker?" Shinn called, coming alongside the Sturm Vogel.

"For now," Kevin replied dryly. "Why? You want to finish the job? Not much I can do about it right now if you do... though I warn you, it's not easy to keep me in the grave."

Shinn snorted. "If I wanted to kill you, I could've done it earlier," he pointed out. "You haven't exactly been at the top of your form lately. I'm here to try and get you out of this mess."

"Good luck," the Baron retorted. "You can't lift me out of here and you know it... and unless Impulse has jumper cables, you can't give me a boost, either, even assuming you had enough power left to make the attempt in the first place."

"He's right, Shinn," Athrun put in, worried now. "But..."

"Forget it," Kevin said, an idea forming. "Can't save the Sturm Vogel, but I think that's a small price to pay, under the circumstances. So, we'll have to do this the unconventional way."

"What are you suggesting, Walker?" Shinn asked warily. "If the machine's a writeoff, how are _you_ intending to get out of there?"

"Genetics, kid," the older pilot replied. "Genetics, and cybernetics. Listen, I need you to fly beneath Sturm Vogel's torso, got it?"

The black-haired pilot stared at him in disbelief. "_Under_ the Sturm Vogel? Are you insane? If that thing falls apart..."

"It'll only be a few seconds," Kevin told him, cutting through his protest. "Just long enough for me to open the hatch... and jump onto Impulse's shoulder."

Shinn paused a beat. "Okay, I was just kidding before, but that really _is_ crazy. You'll be falling at least five meters -unless I want to do something stupid like get too close to a machine that'll crash within seconds of you bailing out- onto a hard metal surface. That's crazy."

"No, it isn't," Athrun said slowly. "Is it, Kevin?"

"No," the Baron confirmed. "Asuka, whatever my problems with my own genesis and the experiments ZAFT performed on me, the fact is that I'm a very durable individual. I've dropped _sixteen_ meters from the shoulder of a mobile suit before, and made three-meter leaps when my cybernetics were fully active. A simple five-meter fall isn't going to hurt me much."

_Simple. Right._ Shinn wasn't sure whether to believe the older pilot or not; the ABADDON team members, Walker in particular, had acquired a reputation on par with the mythical monsters they were named for in ZAFT, but he couldn't help but feel that reputation _had_ to be exaggerated.

On the other hand, he wasn't inclined to bet on it... and it wouldn't be _that_ bad if the Baron happened to splatter himself on Impulse's shoulder. _Except for cleaning up the mess,_ Shinn thought with a mental snort. "All right, Walker," he said at last. "Here I come. Just don't drop the _machine_ on me, okay?"

"Wouldn't help either of us," Kevin agreed, as Impulse maneuvered carefully into position. Watching it approach, he carefully released his safety straps, patted the arm of the seat as though in farewell, and opened the hatch.

Athrun looked up, nervous, as the Sturm Vogel's cockpit opened. _I do _not_ like the looks of this,_ he thought to himself. _I know he _can_ pull it off... but _will_ he?_

The question was answered a moment later, as Kevin leapt from the doomed machine into open air, somersaulting repeatedly as he dropped toward Impulse. With the precise timing that had typified him during the war, his feet came into position at the exact moment he made contact with Impulse's shoulder, giving him a hard but intact landing.

Shinn couldn't feel the impact through Impulse's bulk, but he could hear it with his external pickups. "You aboard, Walker?"

"Safe and sound," Kevin confirmed, "and about as attached as I'm going to get. Now let's find _Minerva_ before I do something stupid, like fall off."

"For once I agree with you," Shinn remarked dryly. "What about the Sturm Vogel?"

Kevin turned to look behind them, and cranked up the magnification on his cybernetic eye. The Sturm Vogel had maintained course for several moments, but, deprived of a guiding intelligence making constant changes to the flight profile, it slowly heeled over to the left, drifted... and turned all the way over, plummeting to the ocean below. There was no explosion, but the uncontrolled impact with the water from an altitude of several hundred meters tore even the armored mobile suit apart.

"...It's gone," he said after a few moments. "Lost to Davy Jones' locker. A pity, but at least _we_ didn't suffer that fate."

"Agreed," Athrun said wholeheartedly. "Besides... I _really_ didn't want to have to explain to Cagalli what happened to you. If I was lucky, she'd just tear my head off and hand it to me."

Shinn shook his head. _I don't even want to know._ "I think we've got another problem, you two," he said aloud. "Where are we, and where is_ Minerva?"_

* * *

Still monitoring communications for telemetry from the missing mobile suits, Meyrin noticed the resumption of data transmission at the same moment Burt Heim stiffened in his chair. "I have contact with the Impulse, Captain!" she called. "It also appears to be carrying the remains of Alex's ZAKU."

Cagalli's stomach clenched. _Remains?_ she thought, tension redoubled. _And what about the Sturm Vogel? Kevin, you _have_ to be okay!_

Gladys nodded in relief. "I'm glad to hear it. But what about the Sturm Vogel? Are you getting anything from Baron Onishi?"

Meyrin shook her head. "No, Ma'am; I'm only receiving data from Impulse and the ZAKU. It... could just be that the Sturm Vogel's transmitter is down..."

"Negative," Heim said, before Gladys could reply. "No sign of Sturm Vogel, but I'm reading a man-sized magnetic anomaly on Impulse's shoulder; the only time I've ever seen anything like it was the first time I had the Baron on scanners."

Gladys nodded, as Cagalli sighed in relief. "That would be his skeleton you're reading, Burt; I remember from my brief time with the Project that a Destroyer's armor-reinforced skeleton made them vulnerable to detection by magnetometers and gradiometers. That's him, all right." She turned to Meyrin. "Fire signal flares, Meyrin; guide them in."

"Yes, Ma'am!" the young woman answered promptly, and swiftly entered the commands into her console. The bright recall flares launched from _Minerva_'s tubes, and very shortly Impulse turned their way, heading in with the remains of Athrun's ZAKU in tow.

* * *

Still clad in a black flightsuit, minus his helmet, Jack Carter stood on the Bridge of the _Nazca_-class destroyer _D'Artangan,_ facing the display that carried the transmission from ZAFT's _Voltaire._ "I'm afraid that's all we can do here, Commander," he told Yzak Joule, with genuine regret in his voice. "I thought about chasing the colony into the atmosphere, but I'm afraid Justice just doesn't have the firepower to make it worth it."

Yzak nodded. _"Understood, Carter. ZAFT will handle things from here."_ He hesitated. _"I never thought I'd say this, especially after everything Captain Walker said about you, but I'm glad you were here. That was one rough battle."_

Carter snorted. "Look, Commander Joule, I'll freely admit I want Kevin Walker dead. However, he's the _only _person I'm out to get... besides Blue Cosmos, of course. And I'm usually none too happy with the notion of cooperating with ZAFT, either; don't think I've forgotten that it was you people who created me in the first place. Still, I no more want the Earth destroyed than you do."

_"I'm sure,"_ Gilbert Durandal put in from behind Yzak. _"I assure you, Captain Carter, your assistance was appreciated... and I think you can assume ZAFT will forget about the matter of your ship having once belonged to us. It's fair enough, after the help you've given us today."_

Out of range of the camera, Jonathon Sarnac rolled his eyes, and Carter couldn't help but at least partly agree with his exec. _Thank heavens for small favors,_ he thought dryly, recalling the manner in which he'd "acquired" the _Nazca _in the first place. He'd actually been assigned to her at one time, when she was still known as the _Tesla;_ then he'd staged a mutiny, using his genetically-engineered, cybernetically-augmented body to take control of the ship, even as some dissatisfied members of the crew came over to his side. After that -and ejecting the loyalists in the ship's lifepods- he'd set out on his own, going on to recruit several ex-Earth Forces officers...

"I appreciate that, Chairman," he said aloud. "I won't guarantee that our interests will never come into conflict -not only do we have different goals, but as I said, I'm not likely to forget Project Serpent Head- but this should go a long way toward defusing potential tensions. Being able to travel without worrying about being shot on sight will be something of a relief."

_"I'm sure,"_ Durandal agreed. _"And, of course, you need not worry about any... repercussions over your departure from that project. That was something else that happened on my predecessor's watch, and yet another of the projects that was instigated without authorization from the Supreme Council. For the time being, at least, we have no conflict, Captain."_

"Glad to hear it." Carter glanced at the watch built into his flightsuit's left sleeve, and nodded courteously to the Chairman. "And now, I'm afraid I need to be moving on, Mister Chairman; we've left our base unattended longer than I'd hoped, and I want to make sure nothing... untoward has happened."

Durandal tilted his head. _"'Untoward'? Do you require assistance, Captain?"_

"No," the clone said; but his tone was less firm than it might've been. "I've just been... concerned lately, about a new development. None of it, however, concerns the PLANTs, as far as I know, so we'll handle this ourselves."

_"As you wish. Good luck, Captain."_

"We'll probably need it," Carter said under his breath, as the transmission cut. "Okay, Jonathon, let's go home. I hadn't intended to leave Miss Allster unattended this long, and I'm concerned. The way Baron Onishi was talking the last time we spoke..."

Sarnac's eyes narrowed. "You're regretting ever contacting him," he stated.

"It wasn't as if I had much of a choice," Carter reminded him. "_He_ found _us,_ if you'll recall. And I had no intention of getting into any deal with _him_ of all people, so I kept our discussions as brief as possible. Now, though... he _did_ create my genotype, Jonathon, in the form of Walker. He also brought Walker up as his own son, and is probably at least partly the reason Walker's so good. Which means that he might well have gotten more information about our operations than I wanted him to... which also means I'm wishing I shot him in the head when I had the chance. Saved Walker _and_ us the trouble he may yet cause."

"So we return at full speed?"

"Flank," the clone corrected. "We reverse course at flank speed, no matter how much wear it puts on the engines or how much reactor mass it takes. I _don't_ like the smell of things right now, Jonathon, and like Walker, I trust my instincts."

* * *

_I really, really wish ESP could be taught!_ Flay thought, charging headlong down one of the base's central corridors. _Kevin would've seen this coming... Kevin would've been ready for it before it even started, and had an escape plan two minutes after he got here!_

Of course, exactly what the origin of Kevin's preternatural sense of imminent danger was something she'd never been certain of. It had long been obvious that he had mental abilities far beyond that of a normal human, but the full extent of them was unknown, apparently even to himself. His stance on the matter was simply that his brain noticed more and reacted faster, occasionally giving his reactions the appearance of precognition.

Whatever the truth was, Flay didn't know... and even if she did, the knowledge wouldn't have helped her at this particular moment. That became evident as a burst of automatic rifle first careened down the corridor from behind, missing her by no more than a meter. Turning to fire back, she noticed with a wince that they were using a far more advanced weapon than she'd originally assumed. She didn't know the specifics, having not been very interested in the matter before her abduction, but she recognized it as a weapon that used electrical pulses instead of a firing pin to trigger the bullet, resulting in, among other things, a far higher firing rate than conventional weapons. She'd seen examples of the technology at Artemis, before her departure from _Dominion_'s crew, but this was the first time she'd seen it used.

It didn't help that particular clone any, though; for all that they had the basic physical capabilities of Kevin Walker, as dictated by their genetics, they still lacked his tremendous store of combat experience... which meant that the clone's clumsy attempt at dodging Flay's bullet was only partly successful. It didn't kill him, but the nine-millimeter hollowpoint still ripped into his right arm, damaging his biceps muscles and forcing him to drop the high-tech rifle.

That left her rear secure, at least for now; she'd already sealed one hatch behind her via a purloined hand grenade, and fried the controls of two others with pistol fire. Unfortunately, she was also running dangerously low on ammunition. She'd started out with a standard fifteen-round magazine, and was down to only three, after the running gunfight through the base.

But Flay was finally nearing her destination at last, and she skidded to a stop just outside the large double-door hatch that led into the base's hangar itself. _Here we go,_ she thought, taking a deep breath. _Let's hope they haven't thought to fortify the hangar..._ She lifted a hand to the control keypad, hesitated, and then typed in the code she'd gleaned from the security center.

The hatch split down the middle, and slid noiselessly aside... and no gunfire emerged.

Casting a wary gaze about the large, darkened, mobile suit-filled chamber, Flay cautiously stepped through the hatch, wondering what awaited her. It seemed too good to be true to think that the rogue clones had completely overlooked this place. After all, it was the only escape route that didn't involve a long, doubtless fatal EVA...

"I thought you'd come here eventually," a voice said out of the dimness. "You shouldn't have been so predictable, Miss Allster."

Flay froze in her tracks, near a mobile suit whose drab colors indicated it possessed phase-shift armor. "Who are you?" she asked, distantly surprised that her voice was so level.

The voice laughed quietly, and the gray-haired man from the surveillance imagery stepped out of the shadow of a stolen ZAKU. "You don't know me," he told her, aiming the pistol in his right hand directly at the bridge of her nose. "But you know my son quite well, I believe. You spent some two months on his ship, didn't you?"

Flay swallowed, and lifted her own pistol... cautiously. "You're Baron Onishi," she stated. "Kevin's father. Except... he told me you weren't his _real_ father."

"Perhaps not," Onishi agreed. "But make no mistake, the boy _does_ possess a small measure of my DNA. Most of that which did _not_ come from Siegel Clyne and his wife was, indeed, written from scratch, in the most ambitious genetic engineering program ever conceived. But some of it did come from me... just so that he would have _some_ of the Onishi blood in him."

"Why are you killing him?" she demanded bluntly. "How can you kill your own flesh and-"

"If he hadn't existed, Irena would still be alive," Onishi interrupted. "If he hadn't insisted on spending so much time in Copernicus, it would never have occurred to Blue Cosmos to sabotage that shuttle launch. The boy always was strong-willed, though, and it was hard to say no... And for that reason, my wife perished." His eyes -jade, like his son's, though not as bright- narrowed. "But that's not the only reason I want him removed from the equation. He was made for one purpose, and he's failed at it."

"What purpose?" Flay asked, trying to keep him talking.

The Baron shook his head with a smile. "Clever, Miss Allster. I see my son gave you some lessons in the art of intelligence gathering. However, I'm afraid I'm not quite that stupid. Oh, I intend to kill you, yes... but it's a bad habit of schemers to reveal all to enemies they know will shortly be dead, only to have those same enemies promptly escape, and use that knowledge to foil the plans of, in many cases, a number of years. No, Miss Allster, I think I'll leave you with the explanation I've already given you." His shoulders twitched in a shrug. "There's really nothing you can do about what's going to happen, even if I let you live. But, like my son, I prefer not to leave any loose ends. Goodbye, Miss Allster." He pulled the trigger...

...Just as Flay triggered the zip line she'd grabbed hold during the conversation, and shot up toward the mobile suit's cockpit. On the way up, she fired a shot of her own, and had the satisfaction of seeing Onishi's left arm begin dripping blood onto the deck. "Maybe I _can't_ do anything about what's going to happen," she called down to the surprised Baron, "but that doesn't mean I can't try!"

She ducked into the cockpit, leaving Onishi to stare after her in disbelief. "She's the daughter of George Allster," he muttered incredulously. "A spoiled brat... she should never have been capable of that." He moved quickly to an intercom panel, as the mobile suit's power began to come up. "Benedict, dispatch clones to the hangar immediately; Allster is getting away in a mobile suit."

_"Understood,"_ the clone replied calmly. _"Dispatching three pilots to the hangar. What's she using?"_

Onishi glanced back, seeing the mobile suit's phase-shift come online. "The Impulse unit Carter stole from ZAFT; it's already equipped with a silhouette pack, and she's also figured out how to activate the PSA."

Benedict quietly cursed. _"I was afraid of that. I don't know how Carter got hold of the thing in the first place, but I do know that nothing we have here can match it one on one. Of all his machines, only Justice could outmatch it... So I'll have them take out a trio of the ZAKUs. Best we can do, Baron."_

"Hmph." Onishi turned to gaze at the Impulse -this one had PSA set in shades of deep blue and black- as it entered the massive airlock leading to the base's launch tunnels. "Hurry, then; she could get away otherwise."

_"Don't try to tell me my business, Baron,"_ the clone said coolly. _"I know what I'm doing, even if most of my fellows don't. I'll warn you now, though, that our chances of stopping that thing, even with an inexperienced pilot at the controls, are not as good as I'd prefer. The phase-shift won't be much of an issue, but its maneuverability and firepower _will,_ particularly if it's using the Force pack Carter had as its default configuration."_

"Do your best," the Baron told him. "I'm well aware my son will realize I'm behind this eventually, but the longer the delay the better. I'm not yet ready to openly reveal myself, and _certainly_ not ready to resume the plans his failure interrupted fifteen years ago."

* * *

ZGMF-X56S Impulse finally made touchdown on _Minerva_'s flightdeck, carrying with it the remains of a ZAKU and one highly unusual young man on its shoulder. _This must look ridiculous,_ Shinn thought privately. _But at least we're alive._

Impulse powered down, while the ZAKU's remnants were laid on the deck, and their hatches opened within moments of each other, allowing their pilots to debark to greet those waiting for them. Athrun came down first, vastly relieved at being out of the cockpit at last. _Been a rough few days,_ he thought, reflecting on the battles. _Two years since I spent much time in the cockpit, but I guess I'm still good enough to survive..._

He saw Cagalli coming then, and waved to her. "Don't worry," he called, "the Sturm Vogel wasn't recoverable, but Kevin's just fine."

She smiled in relief; a smile that widened as she saw Kevin leap lightly down from the Impulse's shoulder, landing as though light as a feather despite the five-meter fall. "Kevin!"

The acrobatic -and highly dangerous- Baron yanked off his helmet, tossed it with his cybernetic hand clear across the deck to Leona who caught the thrown helmet without batting an eye much to the surprise of several people on the flightdeck, and grinned at Cagalli. "See?" he said, walking quickly toward her. "I made it out, just like I said I would." His tone turned serious, and the grin faded. "I'm sorry. I know you must've been worried, but Alex and I..."

Cagalli took his flesh and blood hand in hers, and shook her head. "You did what you had to do," she told him. "You couldn't have stayed out of this any more than Kira could've stayed out of the last war. What happened today..."

A shockwave cut off whatever it was that she'd been about to say, and she -and Athrun- looked about in alarm. Whatever it had been, it was strong, and it felt like their very bones were vibrating. "What's going on?" Athrun demanded. "An explosion?"

Rey Za Burrel, entering the compartment, shook his head (noting with interest that neither Kevin nor Leona appeared concerned). "That was an aftershock from the colony drop," he explained. "The impact was powerful enough to send a shockwave all the way around the world, and it's coming full circle now."

Kevin nodded, absently tucking an arm around Cagalli. "Earth has never suffered a hit of this magnitude," he said quietly. "It's no surprise that we're still feeling the effects."

"They'll probably last even beyond the shockwaves," Leona speculated. "There must be more to the aftermath than just this..."

The Baron nodded. "There will be. According to research my colleagues in Morgenroete and I conducted, the _least_ we're looking at is a rough winter for the northern hemisphere. More likely... Well, let's just say you should get used to seeing a different color in the sky for a few years. With all the dust and debris in the atmosphere, the climate change is probably going to result in some interesting colors for a while." He closed his bright jade eyes. "I wish I could've done more..."

Cagalli gripped his arm. "There's nothing else you _could_ have done, Kevin. Even that one shot you took at the end used all the power you had."

He didn't reply, but inwardly he knew she was wrong. _I could've done more, all right,_ he thought bitterly. _If I'd been smart enough to have Nemesis on standby -or expedited Foxhound's completion- I could've produced enough firepower to reduce Junius Seven to dust bunnies. Instead..._

But there was no sense second-guessing himself now. Hindsight was always twenty-twenty, and what was done was done. What mattered was that they'd done their best, and survived the experience.

Unfortunately, Kevin suspected the incident would have... unpleasant ramifications in Orb. Some of the government he trusted -the Sahaku family, for example, with Rondo Ghina long since removed from the equation- but he'd always distrusted Cagalli's prime minister, Unato Ema Seiran. Leaving aside the long-standing feud between their families, and even Kevin's lifelong antipathy toward Unato's son, there was the matter of Unato's policies. The older man had recently begun advocating a closer relationship between Orb and the Earth Alliance, and that was something Kevin could never condone.

And if it came down to it, he had any number of tools at his disposal to make his displeasure known.

* * *

Murrue was somehow not surprised, when walking into the hidden room that served as Kevin's sanctum sanctorum, to see a black-haired, crimson-eyed woman sprawled on a couch. Outside of those for whom the door would open -herself, Kira, Athrun, Cagalli, and Kevin- there was one person who had access, by virtue of a mastery of computers that rivaled Kevin's own.

"Hello, Max," she greeted. "Why am I not surprised to see you here?"

The other woman stood, smiled, and walked right through a table. "Probably because you already knew I was in the area," Max's holographic manifestation replied. "I'm guessing you already knew Morgan was in flight, so I'm guessing you also expected me to turn up here. You knew Kevin had me deploy?"

Murrue shrugged. "He didn't have the chance to tell us -even Kira hasn't gotten much from him over the last few days, probably because of how busy he's been- but I expected as much. I knew it was the only machine he _could_ deploy just now, though. So, what's up? We know it was bad; bad enough that Lacus took the children down to the shelter. I gather Reverend Malchio's old orphanage was also destroyed. Fortunate that Kevin chose to take them in here."

"Yeah." Max shrugged in turn. "Well, I can tell you Kevin's safe. I had to go stealth and break off when Impulse got close, but I kept an eye on things. The Sturm Vogel is a total write-off, but Kevin took the opportunity to show off, jumping onto the Impulse's shoulder. They subsequently made rendezvous with the _Minerva,_ along with what was left of the mobile suit Athrun was flying."

Murrue nodded thoughtfully. "Well, I'm sure Kevin's hardly displeased by the destruction of the Sturm Vogel; from what I gather about it from the data you sent us earlier. It looks to me like it was just a little too close to some of what Prometheus Unchained is working on. I know he authorized technology transfers to ZAFT, but I doubt he wanted them _that_ advanced."

"The Cap'n does prefer to keep the good stuff to himself," the AI agreed. "Not that I blame him. I don't think he'll ever get over his bone-deep distrust of both sides... not that I blame him."

"Neither do I." Murrue sighed. "Of course, I can't exactly say that _I'm_ entirely displeased with what happened to him. He might well be dead now otherwise... and even if he wasn't, we never would've met, and _Archangel_'s journey would've been that much harder." She raised an eyebrow. "So, do you have any idea where _Minerva_ intends to go now?"

"Probably here, to Orb," Max answered. "They're closer to here than to Carpentaria, and I'm sure Morgenroete has better facilities for repairing something as advanced as _Minerva..._ and under the circumstances, I'm pretty sure Kevin will be willing to foot the bill. He can afford it, after all."

"That's true." Indeed, even with the massive amount of money he'd sunk into Prometheus Unchained, Kevin remained richer than some countries... and his wealth was increasing, through methods Murrue wasn't sure she wanted to know about. She did know that he had an arrangement with at least one mercenary group... and that, during the years since ABADDON, his respect for the law was... variable. He was not at all afraid to step on the other side if he thought the reason was good enough, though there were some lines even he wouldn't cross.

"So," Murrue continued, changing the subject, "what's the status of your own little project? I hope it's going well, considering the potential it has."

Max grinned. "It's going very well, Murrue. It's growing at a steady rate, and should be ready within a week or two, at this rate. And Kevin still has no idea what's going on... yet. Not surprising, I guess, since he still doesn't realize what all we managed to get out of the escape pod after we recovered it."

_Archangel_'s old captain shook her head fondly. She'd come to like the AI a lot in the past two years, and found that she had quite the sense of humor. She also had a _very_ high regard for Kevin, probably because of his role in her creation. The thought of the surprise she was going to spring on him clearly amused the AI. "So you're planning on giving him heart failure, are you? You do know that no one has ever done anything like this."

Max's grin widened. "That's why it's going to work." Then she sobered. "On a more immediate note, Kevin had me get in touch with old Scarface; I spoke with him a few minutes ago."

Murrue's eyes widened. "Him? Kevin doesn't bring _him_ into things unless he's really expecting trouble... trouble of the kind he himself won't stay out of. In fact, isn't this the first time Kevin's actually turned to him for help?"

"Not quite," the AI said quietly. "Kevin hired him once before, in an operation I coordinated. You wouldn't have heard of it -something cloak and dagger he restricted to Prometheus personnel only- but he's done it before, when he needed muscle but didn't dare involve his own forces. Matter of fact, we _still_ can't be involved in anything, because we're not ready."

Murrue closed her eyes. "I thought all he'd done so far was preparation," she murmured. "I had no idea he'd actually involved himself, however indirectly, in world affairs."

"He's been doing that ever since he resumed the name Onishi," Max pointed out. "He may technically be only a bodyguard and the de facto head of Morgenroete, but he _is_ the leader of one of the Five Noble Families. That gives him a lot of clout, and he's used political pressure more than once, often with the Chief Representative's knowledge. He only turned to a military solution that time because there was simply no way to use politics on the situation. It was right in the middle of the War in South America, last January."

The older woman blinked. "South America? I never thought Kevin would concern himself with something like that. He doesn't care about nations or governments; he only cares about Orb because Cagalli's the head of state. Why would he intervene there?"

"My guess," the AI said wryly, "was because it was an opportunity for him to give the Earth Alliance a black eye, without ever being personally involved; you know how much he still hates them. More to the point, though, I believe he knows Ed 'The Ripper' Harrelson."

"Somehow," Murrue remarked, "that doesn't surprise me. Probably ran into him four or five years ago; Kevin _does _seem to know just about everyone in the world. So," she went on more seriously, "he's really concerned enough about the aftermath of Armory One and this attempt to 'break the world' that he's putting Pars on retainer?"

"That's about the size of it," Max confirmed. "We didn't have much time to talk before Impulse showed up, but he's pretty convinced this is last incident isn't going to be the end of it. You want my opinion, I say the only reason he's hiring _only_ Pars' group is because it's the only one he fully trusts."

"A trust that's rather ironic," Murrue pointed out dryly. "The first time they met, Pars wanted to kill Kira, and Kevin responded by just about doubling the number of bones in his body."

"And leaving that scar," Max agreed. "If Pars had been a tiny bit slower, it would've been his head that got split, instead of just his face. I think Kevin respects that."

"He would." Murrue shrugged. "Well, I guess this is something we need to take seriously, then." Her eyes narrowed as another thought occurred to her. "Max... you don't think the situation is series enough for him to...?"

"I think he believes it be," the AI informed her. "Before the colony drop, he instructed me to place Artemis on standby for Himmelkrieg."

_Archangel_'s captain winced. "I don't even want to know how Cagalli is going to react to that," she murmured. "When she finds out that Kevin's been doing extensive weapons research during time of peace, even going so far as to resurrect some Destroyer technology..."

"If the balloon does go up," Max said seriously, "I don't think it's going to matter much. By then, she'll just be grateful that _someone_ was getting ready for it."

"True." Murrue sighed. "Well, I guess all we can do now is wait..."

* * *

A couple of hundred kilometers to the west, a hatch opened atop the _Minerva,_ and several of her crew and passengers gratefully climbed onto the deck. After days of breathing the ship's air, fair away from even the PLANTs' artificial environment; it felt good to breath fresh air again at last.

"Wow," Vino Dupre breathed, gazing out across the vast expanse of blue water. "I never realized how _big_ it was out here..."

"Yeah," Yolant agreed. "Earth really is a big place..."

"Something on the order of sixteen thousand kilometers in diameter," Kevin remarked, coming up behind them with Cagalli at his side, and Athrun and Leona bringing up the rear. "Of course," he added, "a lot of it isn't nearly as nice as the Pacific Ocean. Sometime maybe I'll tell you about the time a good friend of mine spent in Siberia, chasing after an old... acquaintance of mine. He told me, years later, that if he hadn't been wearing a powered exoskeleton, he'd have found the climate _most_ uncomfortable."

The two mechanics glanced at each other, puzzled. "...Powered exoskeleton?" Vino questioned.

The Baron waved a hand. "Nothing you need to worry about, kid. If Chairman Durandal hasn't seen fit to disseminate that particular bit of history throughout ZAFT, then far be it for me to question it. Let's just say that there are still a few unsung heroes from the last war whose tales have yet to be told... and some of them prefer it that way."

Leona glanced at Athrun. "He's talking about Invictus, right?" she whispered.

Athrun nodded. "Right; I guess you didn't get to know him very well, did you? Anyway, yeah, John was chasing Michael Carnehan in Siberia, apparently, around the time the war started."

"Hm; a miracle Carnehan survived." She hadn't known the assassin very long -he'd simply vanished, along with Natarle Badgiruel, within weeks of the truce at Jachin- but she had heard of his reputation. Rau le Creuset hadn't kept the man on retainer for so long for nothing... "So whatever happened to him, anyway?"

He shrugged. "Who knows? Not even Kevin can figure out where they went. We've gotten Christmas cards, and the occasional letter, but aside from that... All I know is that John and Commander Badgiruel went to the same place, at the same time."

"Hm..." That didn't exactly surprise her; she'd heard rumors of the relationship the two had forged, toward the end of the war. In that respect, it was clear that the clone differed from the original... although anyone who'd ever heard the assassin's accent would've known that. There was silence for a few moments as everyone tried to take in the enormity of what had transpired, and then Kevin noticed Leona deep in thought.

"Something wrong, Leona?" Kevin asked.

"I'm just thinking about what the likely outcome of this situation is," came the monotone calm response to which Kevin just snorted.

"That isn't hard to figure out: the EA is going to have a field day with this, and they'll place all the blame on ZAFT." This disturbed Cagalli greatly, though Athrun remained silent, and she looked at Kevin with distress clear on her face.

"You don't think…"

"The worst case scenario is a second war breaking out, which makes the peace treaty between ZAFT and the Earth Alliance a total failure." said Leona.

"But at least it wasn't a total failure out there," Kevin murmured, looking out to sea... and remembering another time, on another sea, two years before, when his worries had been vastly smaller. "It may've scorched the skies, but Earth still survives..."

Cagalli squeezed his shoulder. "You did good out there, Kevin," she said quietly. "You, and Athrun and Leona. I knew you were good enough, and I'm glad you _did_ go out there. You minimized the damage, stopped it from-"

"Give me a break," a familiar, unwelcome, disgusted voice interrupted. "Are you really that stupid? Maybe it was 'minimized', but that wasn't exactly a 'natural' disaster. The fall of Junius Seven was caused by human hands, sent crashing down by Coordinators who wanted revenge for the Bloody Valentine, and still think that Naturals have to be exterminated. It's not going to end just with that, you know."

Cagalli stiffened, remembering earlier accusations that voice had made, accusations which had hurt her, and Kevin felt his expression try to turn thunderous. He had a great deal of patience, but not for people like Shinn. _Not for people who say things like _that..._ especially to Cagalli._ "Suggest you hold your tongue, Asuka," he said, very quietly. "I'd really prefer that you keep a civil tongue in your head when you speak to her. You're being rude, to say the least."

The way he flexed his right hand, the one hidden again by a glove, reminded Shinn that it was metal, not flesh and blood, and that the Baron was fully capable of smashing anyone who annoyed him to paste... but he also understood something else. Kevin Walker was bound only by his own conscience, with little respect for the rule of law when it interfered with his own, personal objectives.

But Kevin _Onishi_ was bound by rather different constraints. Unless he wanted to get his own nation -and, by extension, Cagalli- in a great deal of diplomatic trouble, he wouldn't dare try anything. He might threaten, but he knew as well as anyone that he couldn't follow through.

"I'm not afraid of you, Walker," Shinn said bluntly. "I respected you for how you went out and fought back there, and you were good, but if you're believing the same blind optimism she is, then I don't have much respect for your brains... and the _way_ you fought shows you're not as good as they say you are."

Kevin's right eyebrow quirked. "You know," he said, sounding almost amused, "quite a few people have told me that they weren't afraid of me, over the years. Most of them aren't around anymore... and some of them were a sight better than you on the field of battle."

Leona merely looked amused at the exchange -as usual- but Athrun decided it was time to step in before anything else happened. _I wouldn't put it past Shinn to try to deck Kevin right now,_ he thought with a hidden wince. _Not when Kevin likes to mock people who don't like him. And I don't think Captain Gladys would be happy if Shinn broke his hand finding out half of Kevin's face is made of metal..._

"Shinn _does_ have something of a point," he said quietly, ignoring the look Kevin shot him. "Minimized or not, the fragments still did great damage, all over the world... I don't know if the Naturals will ever forgive us."

Cagalli sighed. "It shouldn't be _about_ Naturals forgiving Coordinators," she said quietly. "We're all human, more or less-" the "less" was clearly a reference to Kevin's drastically-mutated genetic structure "- no matter how we were born. That kind of prejudice just doesn't make any sense..."

Shinn snorted. "You _don't_ know anything, do you?" he asked caustically. "If you really don't have a clue, even about that..." He glanced at Athrun and Leona, and shook his head. "I feel sorry for you two, having to deal with someone like that all the time."

"Don't feel sorry for me." Leona calmly replied, "I have already chosen to walk this path." Before Shinn could say anything else, Kevin cut him off before the words could leave his mouth.

"Not... another... word," Kevin said quietly, jade eyes narrow. "It's true, I can't do anything drastic, without provoking a diplomatic disaster... but that doesn't mean that'll always be the case. I remember people like you, Asuka; I remember idiots with no respect for authority. And if you _ever_ hurt Cagalli..."

The younger pilot smiled humorlessly. "Is that a threat, Walker?"

"No." The Baron's eyes went even brighter then, and the pupils turned to slits, as he allowed his tiger form to make its presence known for a brief moment. "It's a warning. A warning that I haven't always been the upstanding noble I am now... and I may not always be in the future, either."

Shinn stared at him a moment longer. _This is the guy everybody talks about like he's the bogeyman?_ he thought, unimpressed. _He's all talk. Like I'm scared of a stray cat..._ With a final snort, he turned and left... completely unaware that he might as well have shouted his contempt at the top of his lungs.

* * *

"It's confirmed," Djibril told his associates, gazing at the video conference display in his office. "We have pictures now of GINNs planting flare motors on the remains of Junius Seven."

"So they _did_ do it?" one man asked, viewing the images with interest. "I never would've thought the PLANTs would play into our hands so conveniently."

Blue Cosmos' leader shook his head. "No, the PLANTs themselves weren't behind it; that much is clear from the start, simply because of the units involved. Even the Mark II High Maneuver models were retired with the advent of the ZAKU, so it makes little sense for them to be using them in an operation of this magnitude. More significantly,_ Girty Lue_ confirmed that ZAFT's newest ship, along with the new mobile suit we _didn't_ capture, and the Tiger's unit, all fought against the forces behind the colony drop."

"But it _was_ the Coordinators behind the incident?" another member pressed. "There's no doubt of that?"

Djibril shrugged. "I suppose it's theoretically possible someone like the Junk Guild bought up surplus mobile suits and did this, but they'd have no motive... as the public is well aware. They're also likely to be very skeptical of the notion that the PLANTs tried to _stop_ the event... particularly if we omit the fact that _Minerva_ was involved in the first place." He smiled. "We can never forgive them for this, and the average man on the street will agree. Attempting to strike with the wreckage of Junius Seven in the name of vengeance was unjustifiable... and _we_ now have all the justification we need to wipe out the Coordinators at last."

"What about the Crimson Tiger himself?" the first man asked. "Did _Girty Lue_ succeed in eliminating him this time, or has he managed to pull another one?"

Djibril sighed. "Unfortunately, that's currently unknown. We know he fell into the atmosphere, and a powerful energy surge indicates that he probably used up his mobile suit's entire power supply with a single shot, but we haven't actually confirmed his fate after reaching the surface. If he crashed, we might not find out for a day or so yet, and much the same if he didn't. Fortunately, however..." He smiled; and it wasn't a pleasant expression. "We've finally discovered his true identity."

The varied individuals on the display all had the same reaction: tense, yet also eager, interest. "Really? After all this time?"

"Indeed. It seems that my predecessor already knew, but chose not to mention it; given what I recently found in his files, I'm not surprised." Djibril grimaced. "His files weren't very specific on the matter, but it wasn't hard to correlate the information after we realized who Walker really is. It seems that, five years ago, Azrael was running a secret operation, unknown to most of us. Its one true success _is_ known to us -the Mendel operation- but what he never got around to informing us was that he used a Coordinator for the job: Kevin Walker, when he was still ZAFT's Hydra."

One of the senior members stiffened. "That was uncommonly stupid of Azrael," he said quietly. "No wonder he never mentioned it; though it certainly helps to explain why the Tiger was so intent on killing him. So who _is_ he?"

"That's the other reason Walker wanted Azrael dead: his birth name is actually Onishi."

_"Onishi?_ As in the Onishi who currently serves as bodyguard to the Chief Representative of Orb? The one whom Azrael attempted to assassinate five years ago? No _wonder_ that man wants us all dead."

"Indeed," Djibril agreed. "It may also cause us problems down the line; there's no way he'll countenance Orb joining the Earth Alliance... and, as the man who effectively _owns_ Morgenroete these days, he most certainly has the clout to make his displeasure known." He paused. "It's my opinion, gentlemen, that one of our highest priorities should be the neutralization of the current Baron. As both Baron and Crimson Tiger, he poses a threat greater to us than either of his selves could've been separately."

* * *

"We'll be heading for Orb," Gladys told Cagalli, on _Minerva_'s Bridge, "as soon as we've made sufficient repairs to avoid sinking on the way there. I know it's a week or so late," she added apologetically, "but at least you'll soon be home."

"I appreciate it, Captain," Cagalli said sincerely. "And so will Orb... even if all too many of them will never admit it. I really would like to express that appreciation publicly, but under the circumstances..."

Gladys nodded. She, too, had spent considerable time brooding on the public relations repercussions of the "Break the World" incident that had just occurred. She was unhappily certain that the Earth Alliance was going to blame it on the PLANTs... and she wasn't so ignorant of Orb internal politics to be unaware of the disturbing trend the Chief Representative referred to. "I understand, Lady Cagalli," she said quietly. "As does, I believe, your rather... formidable bodyguard. I somehow think he's none too pleased with the situation."

"Yeah," the younger woman agreed. "And the scary thing is, Kevin has the ability to do something about it. I don't know what, but... well, for one thing, his family's been feuding with my prime minister's family for about as long as Orb has existed, and Kevin in particular has some kind of long-running dispute with the prime minister's son. When you put that together with the _political_ situation..." She winced. "I've known him all my life, and there's no one in the world who's closer to me than he is, but sometimes I get a little nervous about what he might do. He's... not exactly fond of the indirect approach."

"He wasn't when I knew him, either," Gladys agreed. "If something irritates him, he's more likely to smash it than to try to reason with it. But... what _could_ he do, in this situation?"

"He's the current Baron of Onishi," Cagalli pointed out. "Just being the head of one of the Five Noble Families gives him a lot power. And while it's true he refuses to have any official role in the government, it's _also_ true that, since he took over from his father, he's quietly bought up the majority of Morgenroete's stock, making him its de facto head. What he might do with _that_ influence..."

_Minerva_'s Captain smiled faintly. "Sounds like he's still hard to predict... at least within his area of expertise."

"That's true enough," the younger woman agreed ruefully. "I had no idea he intended to blow himself up inside GENESIS two years ago; what he might do against _domestic_ enemies... Well, it _probably_ won't be violent, but I'm not exactly looking forward to it, either. On the other hand," she went on thoughtfully, "my prime minister will probably like it even less."

* * *

Gunfire cracked out on the deck of the _Minerva;_ multiple shots fired in quick, thunderous succession... but not in anger, as mere inanimate targets were the ones being filled with holes, not people, as _Minerva_'s crew engaged in harmless gunnery training.

Behind the standard-issue pistols were Lunamaria, Rey, and Meyrin, with Athrun, Kevin, and Leona standing by, watching with interest. Kevin, in particular, was interested in seeing how well they did, considering his own choice of weaponry.

So far, he was quite impressed with Rey's shooting, and Meyrin seemed not too bad, either... though Lunamaria appeared to be having difficulties. _Lack of confidence,_ he diagnosed, as the sharp barks of the pistols continued to fill the air. _Been there, done that... a long time ago._

Luna finally stepped back, and glanced over at Athrun. "I'm not very good at this," she confessed, ejecting the empty magazine from her pistol. "Maybe it's because I'm a pilot; this just isn't the sort of thing a pilot usually has to deal with. But you never know..."

"All it takes is practice," Athrun told her. "You've already got the right mind set, with your mobile suit gunnery; you just need to learn to apply that to small arms."

"I guess..." She gave him a small smile. "You know... you're a hero in ZAFT. To those who don't hate you because of your name, I mean." She nodded toward the firing range. "Care to try it?"

Athrun blinked. "Well..."

Kevin flashed a brief grin. "Go on, Alex," he urged. "Show these rookies how it's really done. It ain't all for show, after all." At the same time, Leona gave Athrun a thumbs up gesture to show that she was urging him also.

The blue-haired bodyguard thought about it some more, then shrugged. "Okay, then," he agreed, taking Luna's pistol. "I'll give it a try." He reloaded, pulled back the slide, and, as Rey stood back to watch, opened up on the targets.

They were all moving around, making them difficult for an inexperienced marksman to hit, but Athrun was by no means inexperienced. He merely closed one eye, concentrated on his sight picture, and smoothly pulled the trigger, exactly as he'd been taught in small arms training years before.

With steady, metronomic precision, he walked his fire along the line of targets, striking each one with unerring accuracy... earning himself a look of respect from Rey as he did so. That kind of marksmanship was uncommon in a pilot, to say the least.

When each one had been hit, Athrun lowered the pistol, ejected the empty magazine, and flipped on the safety. "I'm not exactly bad at it," he admitted. "But I'm not as good as Kevin... and such a skill is really a secondary concern for me, anyway. I'm a pilot, by training."

"You never know when you might have to protect yourself or your charge from enemies," Luna pointed out. "It's good to know how to defend yourself."

"I guess, but..." He raised an eyebrow. "Who _is_ the enemy?"

"That depends," Shinn said from behind him; he'd come up in time to watch Athrun's remarkable shooting. "For one thing... why do you want to go back to Orb in the first place?"

Athrun looked at him for several moments. _That's a good question,_ he thought to himself. _But the answer... I've got nowhere else to go, and my friends are there... It's...very complicated._

Seeing that Athrun wasn't going to say anything, Shinn shrugged and asked the same question to Leona whose calm reply of "It's home," somewhat irritated him because he somehow knew that Leona was thinking that he was an idiot for asking that question, which she did.

Finally turned to look at Kevin. "What about you?" he challenged, a gleam in his eye. "They say you're a legend. Why don't you show us how _you_ shoot, Walker?"

"...Yeah," Luna agreed hesitantly. "I'd like to see it, too."

"Might be interesting," Rey remarked. "I've heard the stories, but..."

Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Legend? A legend is nothing but fiction. One person tells it; someone else remembers. Everybody passes it on. But if you want to see it that badly..."

Athrun had been about to leave, but now he turned back, curious to see how well Kevin would do. He hadn't been present when his friend took on the commandos who'd attacked him at Armory One, and it had been years since he'd seen the Baron do any shooting at all. Leona, on the other hand, took this as a chance to leave, since she knew firsthand how good Kevin was with his dual revolvers.

_While it would be amusing to see Kevin show Shinn how stupid he is, I'm exhausted, that fight must've left me more tired than I thought._ With that thought Leona made her way inside, nodding her goodbye to both her comrades, while giving a short curt bow to both Luna and Rey and completely ignoring Shinn and the quick glare he shot her as she was passing by.

Shinn watch the ex-NGSF woman leave, before looking at Kevin with a smirk. "Go ahead, show us." He was going to enjoy seeing the 'Legend' make a fool of himself. Too bad for him.

"Fine, then." Kevin nodded to Rey. "Get the targets set up, then, please. I'll show you how it's _really_ done."

Luna stepped forward, as Rey attended to the targets. "You can use this," she offered, holding out the pistol Athrun had used.

He shook his head. "No, thanks. I prefer my own revolvers; more accurate, and they're what I've been using for the past four years." The ex-ZAFT super-soldier turned toward the now-set targets, took a deep breath, unfocused his eyes... and moved.

Had Kevin's augmentation been online, Shinn wouldn't have even seen him move. He knew that, because even relying on mere genetically-engineered reflexes, the twin revolvers concealed under his cloak veritably _materialized _in his hands, twirling around his index fingers even as he brought them around to firing position.

Twelve shots cracked out from the antique weapons, six from each cylinder. The air quickly filled with clouds of smoke from the equally-antique black powder Kevin used in his ammunition, briefly veiling the firing line itself from view. Then the revolvers came back around, smoothly dropped into their holsters... and the targets were revealed.

Every one of them had been hit dead center, with a precision that even exceeded Athrun's.

"I may not be a legend," Kevin said pleasantly to a very surprised Shinn, "but I suggest you never, ever forget why I was chosen to lead the Destroyers... and why, out of over three hundred people who have tried to kill me, only those I've _chosen_ to spare are still alive."

Drawing his revolvers again, he blew smoke from the barrels, twirled them around his fingers, and walked back into the ship.

* * *

Author's note: _Minerva_ has safely made its way down to Earth, after facing not merely the Earth Forces, but also rogue elements of their own. Their efforts have spared the planet from destruction, but the results are nonetheless catastrophic... and behind it all, two men with the name Onishi plot against each other, while a single young woman may hold the key to the hidden conflict...

Another chapter done; and a few more of my patented mysteries tossed out. Hopefully, I've been suitably cryptic about it all; more importantly, I hope the chapter was satisfactory. The next should bring us into things hinted at in the end of the previous story, particularly Kevin's antipathy toward the Seiran family in general and Yuna Roma in particular. Till then, feedback is appreciated. -Solid Shark


	8. Chapter 8: Troubled Waters

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"My list of personal enemies is a long one. Most of those on it are also dead... mostly thanks to me. Some aren't, unfortunately, due to politics, lack of opportunity, or -rarely- a slipup of my own. But yes, a long list, whether they be living or dead._

_"The first to arrive on that list, before it became the meticulously-kept computer record -or target list, if you prefer- was a small group of bullies in Copernicus, when I was six years old. They were soon crossed off the list, however, when Athrun and Kira assisted me in... dealing with the problem. Not that I needed much help; and fortunately, the injuries they received prevented them from ever recalling that they were beaten up by a crimson and black-striped tiger._

_"Then came Yuna Roma Seiran, that slimy bastard... We never got along as children, and our antipathy only grew as the years went by and we both developed a certain affection for our fellow noble, the princess of Orb. It eventually escalated to the point that I broke his jaw, during a particularly violent argument. Even at the time, he was slimy, arrogant, convinced of the superiority of his birth, and an utter coward... and those were his good points._

_"Then came an even bigger enemy, if only short-lived. ZAFT Commander Jeffrey Harris, codename Oracle, who masterminded the ABADDON program that was to turn me into the deadliest man alive. Of course, that was only after Muruta Azrael ordered Alex Jackson to murder my parents, while trying to kill me... thus causing the both of _them_ to be added to the list. But I digress. Oracle was, in his way, fully as evil as Azrael, and it was he who forged my hate for the Zodiac Alliance of Freedom Treaty, and he who unwittingly created the weapon of his own demise. When my mind snapped in the end, he became nothing more than fuel for my augmentation..._

_"And then there was the father of one of my best friends, Athrun Zala. His father Patrick was the one who was directly responsible for my involvement in the Project, and that sent me on a long quest to eliminate _him,_ as well. In the end, he died on the same day as Azrael, long after their respective minions had been killed._

_"I made a number of minor enemies over the course of the next three years, most of whom failed to survive the first or second meeting. Of that group, only Jack Carter, my nefarious clone, still lives... and that only because I'm not sure anymore if our feud truly has to be the death. A study in contradictions, that man... but if he chooses the path of survival, I won't complain. Bad enough dealing with the _other_ hundred and fifty surviving clones..._

_"Most galling, however, is the one who stood revealed by the final words of my cousin, Frank Castile. The fact that my own father would go to such lengths, even activating a virus in my own DNA in an attempt to eliminate me, would be enough to earn my wrath. The murder of Frank, however, and the attempted murder of my friend and former subordinate, Flay Allster, is just icing on the cake. The plans I begin to suspect he has for Orb -and by extension, Cagalli- leave me with cold rage in my heart. Baron John Tyler Onishi _will_ perish, before this war is done._

_"Unfortunately, I haven't yet managed to deal with Yuna or his traitorous father Unato... but there's time. For the Hydra, there is always time..."_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

It was Meryl Steiglitz who watched as the ZAFT battleship _Minerva_ slid smoothly into port. In the years since taking up residence in Orb, she'd gotten established at the Morgenroete facilities, working along with Murrue Ramius and several other _Archangel_

crew members.

She also knew rather more about the _Minerva_ than most; Kevin had long since acquired a great deal of data about the ship... and had taken its capabilities into consideration when developing his own next-generation forces. _If that ship ever fought _Dominion, Meryl thought, _they'd be in for a nasty surprise. And if they ever fought Nemesis..._

As the ship finally came to a halt, and a hatch opened, Meryl glanced toward the dock's entrance... and her face tightened at the sight of the individuals who entered. _Yuna and Unato Seiran,_ she thought in disgust. _The two people most likely to make the Captain detonate... especially if he knew just how things are starting to go with that slime ball__Yuna Roma._

Then people began to exit the _Minerva,_ and Meryl took stock of them. _Hm... looks like the Chief Representative's had a rough time, _she thought clinically. Something about her bearing... and then there was Kevin, whose metallic right hand proved he'd been involved in something more than mere diplomacy up there.

Down below, Yuna Roma Seiran rushed to greet Cagalli, and Meryl winced as he hugged the Chief Representative...

Cagalli's eyes widened in surprise, and Kevin wasn't much better off, as he came out of the _Minerva_'s corridors. His own eyes flashed in anger... and he didn't miss the look Yuna gave him over Cagalli's shoulder. _You slimy bastard,_ he thought almost calmly. _Just what the _blazes_ do you think you're up to?_ Regrettably, he doubted there was anything he could do about it; diplomacy was something he didn't like, but understood.

Ironically, it was Yuna's father Unato who, upon seeing the _Minerva_'s officers coming out behind Kevin, shot his son a repressive look. "Contain yourself, Yuna," he reprimanded. "You've startled the ZAFT officers."

Yuna immediately stepped back... though not without another gloating look at Kevin. "Of course, father. My apologies."

Talia Gladys, having by now come to recognize the signs of Kevin's temper -especially after hearing of the near-fiasco in the _Minerva_'s hangar, the first day out of Armory One- cleared her throat in an effort to diffuse tension. "Excuse me," she said diffidently, "but I'm Captain Talia Gladys, commanding officer aboard the _Minerva,_ and this is my executive officer."

"Arthur Trine," the gray-uniformed man identified himself.

Unato nodded. "Welcome to Orb, Captain. I am Prime Minister Unato Ema Seiran, and this is my son, Yuna Roma Seiran." The younger noble nodded respectfully as his name was mentioned. "Thank you for protecting Cagalli this far, Captain Gladys."

"It was our pleasure," Talia replied. "Of course, we couldn't have done it without our pilots, and the bodyguards from your own country." Yuna didn't look happy at the oblique reference to his rival, but she ignored it. "Also, may I extend my condolences regarding the losses suffered by Orb during this incident?"

Unato nodded gracefully, but Cagalli frowned. "How bad _was_ the damage, Unato?" she asked quietly.

"It could've been worse," he admitted. "There were losses along the coastlines, but overall damage was remarkably light. Certainly when compared to that suffered by other countries, such as Eurasia." He motioned toward the harbor's exit. "We have a number of important matters to discuss, in the wake of this incident," he went on. "We have much to discuss, My Lady."

Cagalli nodded reluctantly. "All right. Kevin...?"

"I believe the Baron has matters of his own to attend to," Yuna said smoothly, taking her hand to lead her toward the door. "Some of his holdings were damaged by the colony's fall, and I believe Morgenroete also has some things to bring to his attention. I'm sure we'll need his input later, if only on the defense implications, but for now..."

Kevin stiffened, and even knowing that it was exactly the reaction Yuna wanted didn't stop his glowing eyes from flashing indignantly. "Very well," he said stiffly, sounding more the part of a Baron than Talia had yet heard. "I'll see all of you later," he continued, in a voice that made clear that the Seirans wouldn't enjoy the experience. "In the meantime, I'll be at my mansion, catching up on events... and making my own analysis of the situation, which I'll present at the next Cabinet meeting."

Cagalli watched him carefully as Yuna led her out. _Something's wrong,_ she realized. _More than just today... but what?_ It was a question she had no answers for... and the answers would have frightened her had she known them.

As the Seirans left with Cagalli, Athrun and Leona came out of the _Minerva._ "What's going on?" Leona asked, puzzled.

"Yeah," Athrun agreed. "Where's Cagalli?"

"It seems she has business elsewhere," Kevin said in a quiet, almost calm voice. "In the meantime, I think the three of us should be getting home." He reached into a pocket, pulled out a cell phone, and flipped it open. "Maria, it's me. Yes, I'm finally back on solid ground, and I'd appreciate a ride home. Have the DeLorean driven out to the Morgenroete harbor, will you? Thanks."

Leona raised an eyebrow, amused. "The DeLorean, eh? What, are you afraid the Seirans might try something?" She knew quite well that Kevin's "antique" car actually had a number of features most people wouldn't suspect.

Athrun, however, frowned. "You don't actually think...?"

Kevin barked a harsh laugh. "Alex, you obviously haven't been living among us hereditary aristocrats long enough. Assassination is sometimes a useful tool among my peers... and the antipathy between the Onishi and Seiran families runs deep. Besides which, I represent an obstacle to their objectives, both political and personal. Yuna, I'm sure, would be _delighted_ to see me out of the picture." He smiled coldly. "Not even the Seirans would be crazy enough to try anything on my home ground, though. It's not common knowledge, but... there are a few secrets of the Onishi Mansion that I think you two need to be introduced to."

The trio stepped outside, and found Murrue Ramius waiting for them with the car. Clearly, she'd already been en route when Kevin called... and just as clearly, she'd anticipated which vehicle, of the many kept within the massive edifice, he would prefer. "You called?" she said wryly, opening the driver's side gull-wing door for her friend.

"I did indeed; and I see you're as perceptive as ever, Sis." Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Already on your way, were you?"

"Actually, yes," Murrue admitted, as they climbed into the vehicle. "Meryl warned me about the Seirans coming to meet you, so I thought I ought to head out here... and I figured you'd want to take extra precautions, given the political situation."

"What's so special about this car?" Athrun wondered, sliding into the left rear seat. "I mean, I know it's an antique, but..."

"A couple of reasons, Alex," Kevin explained, starting the car. "First of all, I'm an old movie buff, and acquiring and refurbishing this old thing was a special project of mine a few years ago. Second... well, I haven't figured out how 'time circuits' are supposed to work, unfortunately-" this said with a small smile "-but I've been able to make a few improvements. It's constructed entirely out of stainless steel to begin with, which was a recommendation in itself; in recent times, I've reinforced it with armor plating and transparent aluminum. On top of that..." He reached for the dashboard and flipped a switch. "There. Onboard AKWES system online."

"'Aques'?" Athrun repeated, confused. "What's that mean?"

"AKWES," the Baron corrected. "Anti-Kinetic Weapons Electromagnetic Shield. Same thing that's built into my augmentation; essentially a form of personal force field. Deflects fast-moving metallic objects like bullets, messes up particle beam weapon accuracy, and causes plasma bolts to lose cohesion and disintegrate before contact with the protected object."

Leona whistled. "So _that's_ why battles between Destroyers tend to degenerate into full-contact brawls; I'd wondered."

"Pretty much," he agreed. "Although even there, you almost have to go for a tissue-damage kill; you don't break bones like mine without a _lot_ of power, which is why knives and swords are the recommended weapons for Coordinators to use against us. You can take out major arteries, you can ram through various gaps in the skull into the brain, but only a Destroyer possesses the raw power needed to break an armor-reinforced bone." He smiled thinly. "And not even someone with a lot of money -like, say, the Seiran family- can break through an active AKWES with plasma weaponry. Only a nuke, railgun, or weapons-grade laser is likely to damage us here."

"And at the mansion?" Athrun asked.

"I suggest you wait and see for yourself, Alex," Murrue answered for Kevin. "I think Kevin finally intends to tell you, at least, what he's been up to for the last couple of years, so it looks like you're going to get a good look at why Kevin doesn't worry about the Seirans attacking there. Unlike ZAFT or the Earth Forces -or most of the mansion's residents, for that matter- both Yuna and his father are well aware of the defenses in place there, and neither of them have any desire to be hit with any kind of retaliatory strike."

"Must be interesting," Leona remarked with a small smile. "Paranoia to the end, hm, mon ami?"

"Even paranoids have enemies, Leona," Kevin said, voice suddenly cold. "And it's not paranoia when your enemies turn out to be real. I've found some answers to very pressing questions now, and I intend to... deal with the people behind them."

Athrun stared at his friend, and swallowed. It sounded like Kevin was in full-blown vigilante mode, and when he was like that, the only person who could stop him was Cagalli. Not even Kira or Lacus could stop him... and he had the distinct feeling that whatever was going on, the sandy-haired youth had no intention of telling Cagalli until it was over.

* * *

"You're _what?"_ Cagalli blurted in disbelief, almost coming to her feet in surprise.

"I said, we're considering accepting an offer of alliance from the Atlantic Federation," Unato repeated patiently. "It's actually quite generous on their part, and extends not only to us but also to the other nations, particularly those hardest hit by the recent catastrophe."

The two of them, along with Yuna, were in Cagalli's office in the Orb Capital Building, discussing the implications of the situation... implications which Cagalli found astonishing, and knew Kevin would find infuriating.

"What's this about?" she demanded now. "Another alliance against the PLANTs? Look, Chairman Durandal and the _Minerva_ did their best to _stop_ what just happened. I should know; I was there!"

Unato sighed. _Naive girl,_ he thought. _She still doesn't understand that a nation's foreign policy cannot be based on mere principles..._ "That may be," he said quietly, laying out several photographs on her desk, "but these images speak for themselves, do they not?" The pictures did, indeed, appear to support his claim; after all, they clearly showed GINNs planting the flare motors on Junius Seven's wreckage.

"Whether they did or not, it's not a sentiment we can share with the rest of the world," Yuna agreed. "Can we really tell the millions of grieving people that ZAFT _wasn't_ responsible for this tragedy? A common enemy..."

"That's no excuse," Cagalli retorted. "And those GINNs _weren't_ ZAFT forces; Kevin himself identified them as rogue Next-Generation Special Forces, led by a former member of the ABADDON support team."

The younger Seiran rolled his eyes. "Oh, of course; Baron Onishi and his troubled past. I'm afraid it doesn't make any difference, though. ZAFT _was_ the one who created them, rogue or not, and they bear the final responsibility."

"This is also for the good of Orb," Unato said persuasively. "Do you really want a repeat of what happened two years ago?" Cagalli's expression tightened, and he knew he'd scored a point. "Perhaps you simply don't understand it yet, after being on a ZAFT ship for the past several days."

Cagalli closed her eyes, remembering the horrible day when her father died defending Orb... and then Shinn Asuka's biting words. _"My family was killed in the war because of Athha's ideals! They all died because you people didn't stop to think about how many people might die thanks to your pride! You ever think about that? About the price Orb's people would pay for your own stubbornness? Did you?"_

"You have to know what's about to happen," she said finally, shying away from the old pain. "You _know_ how Kevin feels about the Earth Alliance; do you really want to open fissures in the government like that? He'll never support this move."

"Baron Onishi hates ZAFT as much as anyone," Unato began, "so I believe-"

"He hates the Earth Alliance a lot more these days," Cagalli interrupted. "Most of the people he hated within ZAFT are dead; the same can't be said of the Alliance. He'll consider this treason, Unato, and you know it."

Yuna snorted. "First of all, my dear, the good Baron doesn't even hold an official position within the government, other than representing the Onishi family's interests. Moreover, what exactly could he do about it?"

"Besides break your jaw again?" she remarked, and felt a flicker of guilty satisfaction at the look on his face. "In case you've forgotten, Kevin effectively owns Morgenroete these days, and for all that he's learning to be a politician, I wouldn't put it past him to cancel all Morgenroete military contracts out of spite. His fortune is big enough to keep the company going for at least a little while even without them, so..."

Unato's eyes narrowed. "That's a matter we'll simply have to deal with when and if it arises. In the meantime, I believe there's at least a chance of convincing him that this is the right thing for Orb."

There was, at least, a _remote_ possibility that Unato was right about that. Even Cagalli had to concede that much. _But Kevin doesn't care about what's right for Orb,_ she remembered. _No nation or organization matters to him at all... only those he trusts... and loves.  
_

* * *

It was sunset when they arrived at the massive structure Kevin modestly called home. Built in a style similar to the Athha residence, it was actually considerably larger, having been built to hide the even bigger facility beneath, where most of the Onishi family's business had been conducted for decades... without anyone outside the Orb aristocracy having any idea it was even there.

None of the DeLorean's occupants were surprised to see Kira Yamato and Lacus Clyne waiting for them at the door, Kevin least of all. "Hey, Kira," he called, climbing out of the car. "Long time no see, huh, tovarisch?"

"Feels like," Kira agreed.

"I understand your trip wasn't as peaceful as you'd hoped," Lacus commented, coming forward to embrace her brother. "Kira said there was fighting the day you arrived..."

"There was," Kevin told her, smiling, "but nothing I couldn't handle, Sis. You should know that by now."

"Yeah," Athrun agreed wryly, coming up behind him. "I didn't realize Kevin even still carried guns in the first place, but I can tell he hasn't lost his touch."

Leona was silent as she got out of Kevin's car; even today she still felt guilty about what she had almost done against Kevin's sister, back when she was still with ZAFT, and if she had done what Patrick had ordered her to in his office near the end of the war, then she would never have been able to forgive herself.

"Kevin? Lose his touch?" Murrue chuckled. "That's not very likely; it's practically burned into his brain by now."

"I'm sure," Kira murmured, voice soft. "Come on, we should get inside before dark; and I don't want to leave the kids unattended too long."

"Unattended?" Leona snorted. "I don't think that's very likely, mon ami. I mean, there's Andy, Meryl, Reverend Malchio, and Max here. I'm sure they'd be fine. On the other hand," she continued, tucking her hands into her jacket pockets, "it _is_ getting a little chilly."

"Agreed." Kevin nodded to Kira, squeezed Lacus' shoulder, and walked up to the front entrance of the huge mansion. "It's good to be home..."

* * *

The Onishi Mansion was a much brighter place than it had been when _Archangel_ first arrived in Orb, in March of C.E. 71. Back then, it had been a dusty, gloomy place, unoccupied for three years; Kevin's had been the first footfalls in a long time, as he checked the place over and began to search through his father's old files.

Now it was lively again, with orphans from Reverend Malchio's old orphanage there, along with a number of Kevin's old crewmates from the_ Archangel,_ including the ship's captain... whom Kevin treated as a sister, having sworn an oath during the war that made them family in all but blood.

Now Kevin, along with Leona, Murrue, Athrun, Kira, and Lacus, relaxed in the mansion's enormous library, which two years earlier had been the site of a celebration held by the survivors of the Four Ships Alliance. Far larger than the small study Kevin preferred for solitary contemplation, it was better suited for this.

"Sounds like you had a rough trip, Kevin," Murrue commented. "Here I thought you went up there for a meeting with Chairman Durandal... and you come back after defeating an entire platoon of unknown troops all by yourself, and hindering a catastrophic terrorist attack."

Kevin smiled slightly, drawing his pack of cigarettes out of a pocket. "You knew about the soldiers who came after me, huh? How?"

"You woke me up in the middle of the night, Kevin," Kira told him. "I guess you didn't even know you were doing it, but you were sending me the whole thing." His friend nodded in understanding; their link was still barely understood, but by now they were accustomed to it. "One thing I don't get, though," Kira went on, frowning. "Who was that soldier that helped you out? I've never seen armor like that before. It was kind of like John's, but..."

Kevin lit up a cigarette, and clamped it between his teeth. "It was a Destroyer battlesuit," he said slowly, "a Mark V. Which, by the way, was never constructed before the Project's end, so I was as surprised as you. But as for who... your guess is as good as mine. All I know is that he calls himself Hyperion, and he's turned up twice to help me out... except that the second time, I think he kind of stumbled on the situation. He was actually chasing the so-called Star Thief, though heaven knows why." He closed his luminescent eyes in thought. "That isn't the only weird thing to happen out there, either. Carter turned up, too, in the Justice; and he wasn't even there to kill me. Took out a guy before he could eighty-six me, then helped us cover the Joule team's people."

Kira jerked upright. "The _Justice?"_ he said in surprise. "But... that was scrapped after the war, two years ago! How did he...?"

Kevin smiled around the cigarette. "Actually... that's not exactly the truth, tovarisch. That's what the paperwork said, but... I had other ideas. Unfortunately, Carter took it away from me before I could do anything with it."

"But-" Kira broke off, and shook his head. "I really, really don't want to know what you're up to, Kevin," he said in a low voice. "You _know_ how Cagalli's gonna react..."

"I do," the Baron agreed, voice suddenly much colder, "but right now I don't particularly care. I've got bigger problems, in the wake of Frank's murder."

"Yes, we heard about that," Lacus said softly. "I'm sorry, Kevin. We all miss him... and we all want to find who did it. I'm sure we'll be able to bring his killer to justice."

Kevin stood, and crossed to a window. "I'm not interested in justice," he said, voice hard. "I know who did it, and he's the same unmitigated S.O.B. who's behind Snake Eater."

Murrue and Lacus both stiffened, while Athrun and Kira were simply confused. "Snake Eater?" Kira repeated. "Kevin, what are you talking about? What _is_ that?"

"You've never said anything about it before," Athrun said slowly. "Unless... When you ran into Alec King?"

"Alec King?" Murrue repeated, startled. "Basilisk? He's alive?"

Kevin raised a hand. "One question at a time, please. Yes, Alec is alive; he's serving on _Minerva_ at the moment, as a mechanic. Like me, he's trying to put ABADDON behind him... though I suspect he, at least, still keeps his augmentation active." He turned to Kira. "And Snake Eater, tovarisch, is a genetically-targeted virus that causes gradual cellular apoptosis. It was programmed into my genetic code during the Ultimate Coordinator project... and it's the reason I'm dying."

Kira gasped, eyes wide. "You're _what?_ You never said-!"

Athrun closed his eyes. "Now I understand," he murmured, almost to himself. "Why you insisted on bringing both Leona and me along for the trip to the PLANTs. You were afraid that it would strike then, and leave Cagalli undefended... She doesn't know, does she?"

"No," Kevin said levelly. "And I don't intend to tell her, either. My people have been searching nonstop for a cure for the last month, and we hope to find it before the eight-month time limit we estimate expires. If we do, fine; if we don't, it'll still be eight months, and I do _not_ want to worry Cagalli like that either way."

"It would seem prudent," Leona agreed. "Leaving aside the fact that it would probably make both your lives hell for a while, I really don't think she could govern effectively under those conditions."

"I'm not sure she can govern effectively now," he said bluntly. "Unato and his slimy son are getting bolder... and I suspect another factor is going to enter the equation soon." He looked over at Lacus. "It seems, Lacus, that your uncle and mine isn't dead after all. My 'father' is still alive, and he's the one who activated Snake Eater... and murdered Frank."

Lacus' eyes went wide. "But... but Uncle John is... he died five years ago, when the mass driver was sabotaged! How-?"

"We all made a mistake, five years ago," Kevin said quietly, gazing out at the Moon over the ocean view. "Yes, we all assumed my father died with my mother that day... but it was _only_ an assumption. Let's face it, when a mass driver 'malfunctions', the people within the shuttle being launched by it are effectively turned to paste by the acceleration, leaving little to identify; and even modern forensics can't do much with what was left after _that._ Assumptions were made in accordance with the passenger manifest, but there was never any actual proof that my father died that day."

"But..." Kira shook his head, stunned by the revelations. "But even if he _is_ alive, why wait this long to show himself again? And how _do_ you know it's him?"

"Frank's last words," his friend said softly. "He wasn't trying to tell them to 'tell Baron Onishi'; he was trying to say to tell me that _the_ Baron Onishi, my father, was the one who killed him. Remember, Frank didn't use that title with me, except on formal occasions. He certainly wouldn't have bothered with it when he was dying!" He shook his head, remembered rage and pain washing through him. "And to answer your first question, I simply don't know. He's certainly had a long time to plan... which could, of course, mean that he's been doing exactly that, and waiting for the right moment to strike."

"Maybe so," Murrue said slowly, "but I don't understand his motives, either. From what I know of the man, he was a little odd, but resorting to infanticide...? What's his goal?"

"Devil if I know," the younger Baron said in frustration, moving to drop back into his chair. "I haven't seen him in five years, and I never completely understood him even before then. All I know is that before I was born he was involved in some unsavory stuff, but I haven't got a bloody clue what he might be up to now. As far as I know, he'd been clean following the Ultimate Coordinator project until his supposed death five years ago. I suppose there might still be some records hidden around here somewhere, but... I think we made a clean sweep of those last year."

"Maybe you have John do some searching," Athrun suggested. "After his time working for Le Creuset, he's probably got people he can contact, maybe start looking from there. For that matter," he added thoughtfully, "he might be able to find out more about the current situation with the Earth Alliance."

Lacus sighed. "It's a good idea, Athrun, but even if we could justify asking him to put his life at risk again, it simply isn't possible right now. After the war, he and Commander Badgiruel vanished, and even we don't know where they are now. All we know from their letters is that they're safe somewhere."

"I've got a few contacts," Kevin said reluctantly, meeting Murrue's eyes. "From a long time ago; people I haven't been in touch with since I was Racher, some years ago. I know a couple of mercs who might be able to find out at least a little."

"And there's Canard," Max pointed out, materializing in the room. "Sorry I'm late; I was helping get _Minerva _squared away."

None of those present so much as twitched; even Kira and Athrun were accustomed by now to Max's holographic presence. It _had_ been disconcerting, at first, since she looked so real (though the image was spoiled a little when she walked through solid objects), but by now they were used to it.

Kira was not, however, accustomed to hearing the name "Canard."

"Canard?" he repeated. "You mean Canard Pars? I haven't seen him since that day he came here after the war..." He remembered the day well, when the black-haired young man had arrived at the beach below the cliff upon which Onishi Mansion perched. When he claimed to be Kira and Cagalli's older brother, Kira had believed him -the resemblance between them was uncanny- but even now he had no idea what Canard had been doing there that day. Nor why he'd been injured...

"Well," Kevin said with a slight smile, "that day didn't go quite the way you thought it did at the time. He'd actually first arrived a week before that... in hopes of killing you, as it happens. Unfortunately for him, he ran into me first, and the various injuries I inflicted on him got him to listen to me long enough to convince him that what he was doing was not only a very bad idea, but also based on heavily biased information." He shrugged. "I still don't know exactly what set him off in the first place, but it doesn't really matter, as long as he doesn't try anything stupid again. Anyway, given that he himself is a product of the Ultimate Coordinator project, he might be able to find information even I couldn't. Exactly what, I'm not sure -I had my people check everything in Mendel remotely related to the project- but there might be clues he could find that I can't. And," he went on with a grimace, "I can't exactly do any investigating myself right now. At any other time, I could probably justify disappearing for a month or two, but not when the political situation is so delicate."

"And not when Yuna Seiran is getting bolder, hm?" Murrue said softly.

"There's that, too," he agreed, clenching his metal fist. "Cagalli is... going through a rough time right now, especially with that punk Asuka's words in her head. I know he hurt her more than she lets on; maybe more than she knows. Combine that with her prime minister and his slimy kid double-teaming her in both public and private life..."

Lacus sighed. "It sounds like your father's reappearance will simply serve to make the situation even worse. If that is so, then he needs to be brought to justice as soon as possible..."

Kevin shook his head. "No. My father will never see trial."

His sister looked at him sharply. "Kevin," she said reprovingly, "I know how you feel, but he's your father, and he deserves a fair trial."

"I don't care," he retorted, eyes flashing as a trace of his old self asserted itself. "For one thing, I don't trust courts; they're always more concerned with the rights of the perpetrator than the rights of the victim. Also, I'm afraid you haven't lived here quite long enough yet. Otherwise, you'd know how depressingly easy it would be for a noble of his stature to escape the legal system without a _lot_ more evidence than we have right now." He shook his head again. "No, Lacus. This is my responsibility; I owe it to Frank, and my father owes it to _me."_

"You're suggesting patricide," Murrue pointed out carefully. "Are you sure you're prepared for that?"

Kevin rubbed his right shoulder, where he'd once taken the bullet that cost him the arm. "I committed fratricide when I was sixteen, Sis," he reminded her. "Patricide, particularly after everything my father has done, doesn't bother me particularly." He swept his gaze around the room. "I don't enjoy killing," he said quietly, jade eyes bright and intent, "but neither am I particularly bothered by the number of bodies in my past. One more won't matter much... particularly when the vnyebrachnyi so thoroughly deserves it."

"If you need a hand," Leona drawled, "you have but to ask, mon ami. I know a thing or two about assassinations myself."

"I'm sure you do," Kevin said dryly, recalling his associate's past with the NGSF.

Lacus looked -and felt- more than a little troubled. "Kevin, please think carefully about this," she said in a low voice. "I understand how you must feel right now, but he _is_ your father. This isn't a decision to be made lightly... and vengeance isn't the path you should be taking."

"That's one matter I can't agree with you on, Lacus," he replied, looking away. "I've had too much experience in the real world over the last few years to have any hope that 'justice' can bring down someone like my father. Sometimes, if you want it done right you have to do it yourself."

His pink-haired sister still looked rebellious, but Murrue -knowing full well that trying to sway Kevin when he was in vigilante mode was akin to asking water to become rock- quickly cleared her throat. "On another matter," she said carefully, changing the subject, "the _Minerva_ is still in port, needing repairs. I, for one, think they're more likely to ask for repairs here than to risk going all the way to Carpentaria. So, any idea what will be done about that?"

"I'll pay for the repairs out of my own pocket," Kevin told her firmly. "I still don't like ZAFT -you all know that- but except for that undisciplined brat Asuka, I _do_ approve of _Minerva_'s crew. They're a good bunch, and without them, not only would Cagalli, Leona, Athrun, and I be dead, but so would most of the population of Earth. We owe them, and I intend to repay them however I can."

Max chuckled. "It'll put a bit of a hole in your pocket, Cap'n, but I think you can probably afford it. For that matter, you'll probably recoup the before too long, anyway, the way _you_ make money."

"She's got a point there, Kevin," Kira agreed. "Though where you get it all, I'll never know."

Kevin waved a hand. "I'll let you in on a little secret, Kira: even _I_ don't know where all my income comes from. Remember, the Onishi family fortune is gargantuan; one man, even one with my capacity for multitasking, can't possibly manage all that financial stuff alone. That's what I've got financial _advisors_ for, and they handle a lot of investment gobbledygook for me. I've no idea what they're up to half the time."

"Which may be a problem," Athrun said suddenly. "I just had an ugly thought, Kevin: what if your father openly returns to Orb, before we have enough evidence to at least cast suspicion on him? He could reclaim the title, and with it all the associated accounts and property..."

"I think my brother's been a little smarter than that," Murrue said dryly. "He certainly has been as far as some of his more... questionable research and development is concerned."

"True enough," Kevin conceded. "As a matter of fact, I've been funneling money into accounts under my own name for the last six months; and I had Max accelerate the process when I realized Father was still alive. I can't say I'd be terribly pleased if he did it, but about all I'd lose would be the mansion and my direct connections to Morgenroete. Most of my wealth actually comes from my personal fortune these days."

Kira looked at him suspiciously. "Do I even want to know what you've been funding lately? You didn't start moving that much money into secure accounts if you weren't up to something. I _know_ you, Kevin."

"Sensitive projects," the Baron said simply. "Of a highly classified nature... or they would be, if anyone knew of them to classify them in the first place. Suffice it to say that, unlike Cagalli, I fully anticipated the renewal of hostilities... and prepared for them." He sighed, put out his cigarette, and stood. "Look, I don't know about you guys, but I've had a long week. I'm going to crash, then recharge my batteries. See you all in the morning."

He headed off, and Leona glanced around in puzzlement. "Um... doesn't one 'recharge one's batteries' _by_ going to sleep?"

"He meant it literally," Athrun said thoughtfully, gazing after his friend. "I remember him mentioning during the war that his augmentation's active systems are powered by advanced radio-isotope thermoelectric generators. RTGs like his don't have to be recharged very often, especially when the systems they power haven't been active in a long time, but after two years..."

Kira sighed. "I don't like what's going on, Athrun. There's so much going on right now that's threatening to bring Kevin's old personality back to the surface."

"I'm not so sure that would be a bad thing," Lacus said softly. "I know that he does things I would rather he didn't, but... what he's going through now is tearing him apart." She looked at her boyfriend. "You must've noticed, Kira, through the link. Trying to be both Kevin Onishi the politician, and Kevin Walker the soldier, is destroying him. He can't be both at once... and you know as well as I do that this isn't what he wanted to do with his life."

He nodded slowly, sighing. "You're right, I guess. But... I know Cagalli doesn't want him to fight anymore, and you _know_ he'd end up mixed in the war somehow if he went back to his old ways."

"I'm not so sure he can avoid it now," Murrue pointed out. "Kevin holds the reserve rank of Colonel in the Orb Mobile Suit forces, and this nation is going to get embroiled in this conflict; you know that. Two years ago the country was pulled in when the entire government was determined to remain neutral. How do you think it'll go when the prime minister himself is in favor of joining the Earth Alliance?"

Kira looked away. "Kevin would never stand for that," he said in a low voice. "He doesn't care about Orb as a nation, but he cares about Cagalli... and he hates the Earth Alliance more than anything right now. He'd fight them with every tool at his disposal."

"And that includes Morgenroete, in a way," Andy Waltfeld chimed in, stepping in with nary a limp; the prosthetics that had replaced the limbs he'd lost in the destruction of his LaGOWE two years previously weren't as advanced as Kevin's, but they were still very good. "Even if it means his pocket book takes a big hit, Racher won't hesitate to cancel all military contracts if the alliance is signed. And that doesn't count the military options; even without his... special projects, he _did_ take control of the Onishi family _Izumo_-class last year."

"Once he finally _found_ it," Max remarked acidly.

_That_ comment Leona understood. She'd joined Cagalli's bodyguard team by the time Kevin finally got around to tracking down his family's holdings, and she remembered his incredulous irritation when he discovered his father had hidden the ship in an old resource satellite, long disused, that had been brought into Earth orbit by the Onishi family decades before, during some kind of mining operation. She could still remember the look on his face; Kevin hadn't been too pleased to learn that his father's paranoia rivaled his own.

"You think it'll really come to that?" Athrun wondered. "Cagalli would never let him-"

"What makes you think Cagalli will have much of an option?" Murrue asked quietly. "You want my guess, the Seiran family is going to do their very best to keep Kevin away from her from now on, try and split them apart somehow. I hate to say this, but Cagalli does _not_ have the experience for the job she performs now, and Kevin is her primary support. The Seirans will do everything in their power to separate them... and the scary thing is, they might succeed. Right now, they're both off-balance, and that makes them more vulnerable than I think they've _ever_ been."

Silence permeated in the room after her observation, only to be broken by Leona's voice, "Then I guess we should get ready for war."

* * *

Talia sat in an office within the underground Morgenroete facility, with Trine; once the place had been destroyed by self-destruct charges, but it had been rebuilt since the war, and _Minerva_'s captain supposed she'd be seeing a lot of the place for a while.

"I'm leaving you and Aves in charge of the repairs," she told her exec now. "I expect I'll be handling a lot of administrative work for the time being, given the circumstances. Fortunately, we _do_ have the full support of at least one of Orb's nobles; that should work in our favor."

Trine nodded, but still looked unhappy. "I still think we should seek repairs from Carpentaria," he said, respectful but firm; he hadn't been chosen for his post in the expectation that he would be a yes-man. "Giving Orb this kind of access to the _Minerva_'s systems..."

Talia smiled almost sadly. "I understand your position, Arthur, but we really don't have much choice. There's no guarantee that we could even _reach_ Carpentaria in this condition, after all; and as for the sensitive nature of _Minerva_'s technology, I should point out that, first, the Earth Alliance has already stolen three of our prototype mobile suits, and second... Well, I've seen a few things lately that lead me to believe that some factions within Orb may already have technology as good as or better than ours. Certainly the unexpected appearance of the Justice during the colony drop was a red flag, as was the appearance of the ABADDON strike fighter."

"Captain Gladys is right, Mister Trine," Murrue said respectfully, stepping in with one Kojiro Murdoch in tow; they were both dressed in Morgenroete mechanic coveralls. "I know _I_ wouldn't want to try moving that ship too far at the moment; and besides, Baron Onishi _is_ paying for your repairs out of his own pocket. That can't hurt, right?"

Talia raised an eyebrow. "And you are...?"

Murrue held out her hand. "Maria Bernes, Captain. It'll be my job to oversee repairs of your ship. I... have a certain amount of experience in the area."

_Minerva_'s captain nodded. "Thank you, Miss Bernes. I expect we'll be seeing a lot of each other for the foreseeable future." She took the proffered hand with a smile. "So, how long do you estimate the repairs will take?"

"That's hard to judge," Murrue replied with a shrug, "considering that I haven't yet had a chance to look over your ship just yet; I'll need to see the extent of the damage, and of course much will depend on your ship herself. Still, a rough estimate would be at least a couple of weeks, maybe more. A rough reentry like the one you experienced is hard on a ship... and even harder on mobile suits."

Talia chuckled. "Yes, that's true. Fortunately, though only one of the three units that endured independent reentry, that one suffered only minimal damage, which we're quite capable of taking care of ourselves. The ship, on the other hand... Well, we were a little understaffed in the first place, and no ship's crew is really equipped to handle major repairs. That's what shipyards are for."

"Indeed they are," another voice said, and a black-haired young woman with crimson eyes stepped in. "I've had some experience in that area myself, and... Excuse me," Max interrupted herself, taking in the look on the ZAFT officer's face. "Was it something I said?"

Talia shook herself. "Ah, no, excuse me. It's just that you look just like a woman I knew briefly, five years ago; you look to be about the age she would've been, if she were still alive..."

The AI nodded. "Oh, yeah; Rachel Carver, right? Baron Onishi's mentioned that a couple of times. Well, the name's Max Walker; I usually act as a direct liaison between Morgenroete and Baron Onishi, with a little computer programming on the side. I'll probably be handling most of the administrative details while you're here."

The captain blinked, surprised anew. "Ah... did you say Walker?"

Max laughed. "Don't think anything of it, Captain. Let's just say that the Baron... helped me out a couple years ago. Walker isn't really my name, but it's what I use for public consumption."

"I... I see." Actually, it did make an odd sort of sense. After all, just about everyone _else_ she'd ever met who was connected with Kevin -whichever identity he was operating under- was just a little bit strange. "Still," she went on, "is this really the right time for Orb to be helping a ZAFT vessel this way?"

"Maybe not," Murrue conceded, "but there's no point worrying about the future right now. Maybe Orb will join the Earth Alliance in the future, but you're here right now. We can worry about later, later. Besides which," she added with a slight smile, "it's generally not a good idea to tell the head of one of the Five Noble Families 'no' when he says to repair a ship."

* * *

The morning after _Minerva_'s arrival in Orb, Athrun found himself walking slowly along the beach beneath the cliff upon which Onishi Mansion perched. The place had seen a certain amount of action over the past two years, most notably when Mu La Flaga had fallen to his death, his body swept away into the ocean... and the day when Canard Pars had made his first, painful appearance.

Now he simply found it a good place to spend some time thinking. About the past... about the words a bitter, insane terrorist had said to him, as Junius Seven fell from the sky...

Athrun knew that Kevin had simply dismissed Sato's words, putting no stock in the things spoken by a man he concerned a traitor to both his unit and his own comrades... but for Athrun, it wasn't so simple. _For Kevin, he could ignore it because he's never had close relationships except with his friends... his father was always distant with him, which is why he finds it so easy to contemplate patricide now. But me... My father was a good man, before Junius Seven broke him. I..._

"Hi, Athrun."

He jerked, startled out of his reverie, and turned to see Kira watching him, having apparently come down to the beach while he was distracted. "Kira...?"

"Kevin told me you were troubled by something," Kira explained, walking over. "I figured I should come see how you were doing."

"Kevin told you...?" Athrun glanced up then, and saw a black-clad figure standing on the edge of the cliff above. "Right... I forgot." He shook his head. "You know, it's hard to have a little privacy when you've got an empath wandering around."

(_I told you he'd figure it out,_) Kira told the silent figure. (_He's been around us too long since the war._)

There was a distinct mental snort on the other end. (_So? If he was thinking straight, he'd remember he knows how block that. Besides, he _does_ need help, doesn't he?_)

(_True._) Kira didn't need Kevin's "sixth sense" to know that; he could tell just by looking at Athrun. "So," he said aloud, "you gonna tell me what's wrong?"

Athrun sighed. "It's... well, it's something I heard on the way down from orbit. That Sato guy... He told me that... my father's policies were the right ones, that the world has forgotten the lesson of the Bloody Valentine. I think... that he was trying to say that I betrayed what my father stood for..."

His friend nodded sagely. "It's still bothering you, isn't it? What happened two years ago..."

"...Yeah, it is." Athrun shrugged. "I'm not like Kevin, Kira; I can't just shrug off what my own father did... not even after all this time." He sat on a nearby rock, and stared out over the ocean. "I remember the first time I came to Orb, during the Atlantic Federation's attack... Just before the _Archangel_ went into space, we talked, remember? I didn't know what I was fighting for then, and neither did you guys, really, except for Kevin. Dearka certainly didn't. You said... that we'd find the answers together."

"Yeah, I did," Kira acknowledged.

"But..." The blue-haired soldier turned his gaze to the sky. "Even now, I don't think I've found that answer. What Sato said... some of what one of _Minerva_'s pilots had to say... and even Kevin, really... they've all made me realize that, even now, I _don't_ have that answer. They're all so sure of what they're fighting for, but I'm not. Shinn Asuka asked me why I do what I do... and I don't honestly know, Kira."

Kira tilted his head. "So, what do you do from here, then? How are you going to find the answers you need?"

Athrun was silent for a long moment. "I need to know what's going on," he said finally. "I can afford to leave for a while -Kevin and Leona can certainly take care of Cagalli by themselves- so I'm going to go to the PLANTs. I can't trust the information coming out of the Earth Alliance member states, and I don't think the Orb government is on the level right now, either. So I'm going to see Chairman Durandal... and see what kind of answers I can find there."

Kira nodded slowly. "If you believe that's what you need to do, Athrun, then do it. I guess this is something you can only do for yourself, huh?"

There was a soft thud in the sand a couple of meters away, and Athrun glanced over to see Kevin had dropped from the cliff with his usual blithe disregard for heights. "Go for it, tovarisch," he advised. "I have my doubts about ZAFT and the PLANTs, but that's only my old paranoia talking; I really think Durandal is on the level, that he's genuinely trying to reform the system. So if you have to do this, then _do_ it."

Athrun smiled gratefully. "Thanks, you two."

* * *

"Got some news," Vino announced, entering the crew lounge on the _Minerva._ "Word is, we might be allowed to disembark for a while."

Yolant perked up at that. "Go out into Orb, you mean? Get off the ship for a while? That'd be nice. But... how reliable is the rumor?"

"It's probably reliable," Alec King put in quietly, looking over engineering data on a pocket computer. "It's not exactly a secret that we're here, after all. Might as well let the crew get some fresh air while we're here, stretch our legs a bit. Besides," he added with a small smile, "I doubt anyone would dare make much of a fuss. After all, we've got the support of a major player in Orb politics; probably the one Orb noble who really understands what ZAFT is going through right now. After all, he's a soldier himself."

Meyrin glanced at him, eyes wide. "You sound like you know him, Kyle. Personally, I mean."

Alec allow himself another slight smile. "Oh, you could say that. I had a few run-ins with him years back, when he still came to the PLANTs fairly regularly."

She nodded, accepting that, and went back to discussing the implications of the possible shore leave with the others. The man once known as Basilisk, however, thought of none of that. _I wonder how you people would react if you knew the true story,_ he thought to himself. _If you knew that Kevin isn't the only survivor of that project... that I am, too, along with a certain sniper..._

For that matter, Alec wondered how _Kevin_ would react if he knew the identity of the sniper who had fired that one shot in the orbital battle.

And not even Basilisk knew for sure just how much from ABADDON still survived.

* * *

A few hours later, in Orb's Capital Building, Cagalli rubbed her temples in an attempt to stave off a headache. Paperwork was tiring enough at the best of times, particularly when one was the head of state for an entire country. In times like this, when war was threatening to break out anew...

_Things were so much simpler during the war,_ she thought, almost wistfully. _Even running _Dominion_'s mobile suit unit was more relaxing than this._ She snorted at the thought. _I guess it's a bad sign when I start feeling nostalgic about a ship that's been razor blades for two years now..._

Right now, she was going over preliminary reports of the damage caused worldwide by what was now being called the "Break the World" incident; only preliminary, because the body count was still rising...

Cagalli's head came up quickly, though, when the door to her office suddenly opened. "Who-? Oh, am I glad to see you," she said, with feeling, as Kevin stepped in. "How do you have such good timing, Kevin?"

"Clairvoyance," he replied, deadpan. "Runs in the family. Actually, though, I happen to have a certain amount of experience with paperwork myself, and I figured you were probably nearing your limit about now. So... I thought it was time I spirited you away for a little while."

She raised an eyebrow. "What do you have in mind? If you're thinking about taking a vacation in the Debris Belt or something, I'm sure it would be an improvement, but I don't think my prime minister would be very happy with you."

Kevin snorted. "Prime Minister Unato Ema Seiran can go take a flying leap out an airlock without a suit, for all I care. Actually, though, I thought you could use some lunch. There's a place I'd like to introduce you to; and I guarantee you've never been there." He jerked his head at the door. "I already arranged things with your secretary, by the way; if you don't come along, it'll wreck your schedule."

Cagalli couldn't help but laugh at that. She didn't know whether he'd simply told the secretary to do it, or gone to the length of hacking into her schedule himself, but she appreciated it nonetheless... and saw from it that he still couldn't resist the odd underhanded deed. "Okay, Kevin, let's go. I _am_ getting a little hungry, now that you mention it."

"Me, too," he admitted. "And you know me: my genetic advantages come at the cost of a monster appetite, especially when my RTGs need to be recharged. Hey," he said defensively, when she started to frown, "a guy can't be too careful. I might _need_ that stuff again someday. Besides, that's part of what powers my arm."

"Right..." Even now, Cagalli sometimes found her boyfriend hard to figure out, but at least he was in a better mood than he had been when _Minerva_ first arrived in Orb. "Well, then, let's go... before somebody notices you."

"Roger that."

* * *

Somehow, Cagalli was not surprised to see that Kevin had once again taken the DeLorean. When alone, he generally used a motorcycle -as befitted his usual carefree attitude toward life in general- but when he had need of passenger space, he took the antique stainless-steel car from one of the old movies he so enjoyed watching.

The fact that it was also very likely better protected than any official Orb government vehicle probably had something to do with it, too.

What _did_ surprise her, though, was their destination. The place Kevin had driven them to seemed fairly plain, with an almost plebeian name. "'The Western Eating Parlor'?" she said, puzzled, as they walked to the entrance. "That doesn't sound very exotic."

Kevin laughed. "That's because you don't travel in my circles, love. Take the first letter of each word in the name. What do you get?"

"Twep?" That didn't really clear things up for Cagalli... but then a light went on in her head. "No. TWEP. Terminate With Extreme Prejudice." She looked at him incredulously. "This... is a spook bar?"

"Something like that, yeah. More accurately, a spook bar/restaurant." Still chuckling, he led her into the unassuming establishment... which she now knew would be anything but on the inside.

_I should've known,_ Cagalli thought with resigned fondness. _If there was going to be a place like this in Orb, Kevin would've found it. Once a soldier, always a soldier..._

Sure enough, the maitre de clearly recognized Kevin, and walked right over... with a slight but noticeable limp, which went well with the myriad scars on his face. "Well, well, if it isn't the Baron," he said cheerfully. "With a guest, no less! Your usual table, mon ami, since you have company?"

"Please, Francois." Kevin turned to Cagalli. "They don't know my exact background -hardly unusual in this place- but they do know I used to be in the same business they are. This is Francois Delacroix, former Eurasian Federation agent. He was invalided out a few years ago, and wound up working here... where his former masters couldn't get at him."

"Took a tungsten penetrator to the right leg," the Frenchman said regretfully, "while I was in the middle of a knife fight. The prosthetic works fairly well, but I've never quite gotten used to it." He looked closely at Kevin's own facial scar, and raised an eyebrow. "I see you've uncovered the scar," he observed, "and dispensed with the mask. Anything I should know about?"

"Nothing that won't be on the news soon enough," Kevin said ruefully. "As for the mask, it got a little broken up during a battle recently. You've probably heard about it by now, given the clientele here."

"Armory One, yes," Delacroix acknowledged. "Nasty bit of business, that. Well," he went on, motioning toward a table, "enjoy your meal, mon ami; from the look on your faces, I'd say you two both need some time off." With that, he swept off into the establishment's dimly-lit corners.

"I'm surprised he didn't recognize me," Cagalli remarked as they sat. "I mean, Kira was one thing, when we first met; he was just a college kid, and I wasn't well-known outside of Orb. But that guy was a retired _spy..."_

"Assassin," Kevin corrected absently, picking up a menu. "I met him when I was still an amnesiac, during a Blue Cosmos attack. The attack in which he got those facial blemishes and lost the leg, in fact. And I'm sure he _did _recognize you, actually; but this isn't the kind of place where they worry much about that. Besides, you're with me, so they know not to make too much of a fuss."

Cagalli raised an eyebrow. "You come here often, Kevin? I always wondered where you disappeared to at dinnertime..."

"I like the food, and I can relate to the patrons," he said simply. "Besides, I know a lot of these guys, from my wilderness years." He nodded at a woman at another table, who responded with a mock-threatening wave of a fork. "Beijing, not long after I left Andy's place; we ran into each other in the zoo. She was tracking a target, I was trying not to be tracked by somebody else, a firefight started, and we found ourselves being shot at by each other's enemies. Fifteen seconds later, we're back to back, all the gunmen and two rampaging elephants are down."

She chuckled. "I heard about that one, I think; I didn't know it was you, but it did make the news."

"I'll bet it did. Then there was the time I was holed up in an old German castle..."

"That's when I had to haul you out of the moat," a new, heavily-accented voice said. "Quite a heavy burden for someone your age and apparent size, you know."

Kevin's eyebrows went up, and he glanced across the room at a Germanic fellow with a thick beard and a bayonet on his belt. "Manfred Dieter," he greeted. "Fancy meeting you here. Just passing through?"

"Ja. Wealthy client in South America wants some assistance, so we leave tomorrow." Dieter laughed. "If you'd been a day late, I wouldn't have seen you here, Baron." He stood, tossed off a salute, and headed for the exit.

"Good hunting," the Baron told him with a half-smile. "Manfred Dieter," he said quietly to Cagalli. "Leader of the Totenkopf, or 'Death's Head', mercenary group. Near the top of their field, commanding high prices from those who would hire them."

Cagalli shook her head. "I'm not sure I wanted to know you knew so many people like that, Kevin; and I'm _really _not sure I wanted to know the leader of a mercenary group was passing through Orb." She glanced around. "And is it just me, or is everyone here armed to the teeth?"

"Of course they are," Kevin agreed. "That's why this place is so safe."

_"Safe?"_ she repeated incredulously. "I don't know about you, Kevin, but I don't think that many guns are exactly 'safe'!"

"Just think about it for a second, Cagalli," he told her. "With a few exceptions, none of these people work together. That means nobody's going to get together a large group or anything. Now, considering that, would _you_ start trouble in a place like this? You'd be shot dead and hit by enough knives to make you look like a pin cushion before you could get out of your seat."

Cagalli thought about that. "Good point."

They spent some time in companionable silence after that, ordering and then digging into their lunch, and Kevin's thoughts turned inward. _Remarkable how easy this is now,_ he thought, glancing at his gloved mechanical hand as it deftly manipulated a fork. _My arm is metal, circuitry, and actuators now, instead of flesh, bone and muscles, yet I can manipulate it with just as much precision as the limb it replaced. It grants me even greater strength than the cybernetically-augmented arm, and can withstand blows that could crush even me... yet for all that, it's even more alien than the cybernetics that make me what I am. Metal and synthetics, cold and lifeless... yet though I can finally restore my arm and eye to flesh and blood, I still refuse, keeping these inorganic replacements. Why? Is it because even cloned transplants would be just as much replacements as the machines... or because this symbolizes what I've become? The melding of man and machine, crafted into a weapon more deadly than any mobile suit..._

"Kevin? You okay?"

Kevin's eyes snapped into focus, and he blinked. "Huh? Oh, yeah. Sorry. I was just... thinking." He gazed into his plateful of lasagna, not even really seeing it. "It's just... a lot has happened, you know? Over the last five years."

"Yeah," Cagalli agreed. "...You know what Unato is proposing, don't you? You must've heard, by now."

"Da." His jade eyes flashed as he scowled. "Yeah, I've heard... and I can't say I approve."

"Neither do I," she said frankly. "He talks about how we have to 'think about whom it is we should share our pain with'... but what it really comes down to in the end is joining those who hate the PLANTs, and want them to be destroyed. It's expedience, not principle." She sighed. "Unfortunately, I don't exactly operate in a vacuum. I may be Chief Representative, but others can override my decisions if they want it badly enough."

"Like Unato," Kevin said darkly, "... and his son, right?"

Cagalli looked away. "Kevin..."

"I don't like what Yuna's starting to do," he said simply. "I've known for a long time now that he fancies you... and right now, I'm pretty sure he's trying to act on that."

"You may be right," she admitted, not meeting his gaze. "He didn't before, I think, because he wanted to wait until we were older... and, I guess, because it's taken him this long to write you off as a threat."

"If he's done that, he's gonna find out the hard way that I haven't completely lost my touch," Kevin muttered, clenching his fist. "I..."

"I should hope you haven't lost your touch, tovarisch," a Ukrainian-accented woman's voice purred. "I'd find that to be quite the disappointment."

Kevin's head whipped around so fast Cagalli was momentarily afraid it would fly off his shoulders. _"Bozhe moi!" _he hissed, staring at the thirtyish, brown-haired, silver-eyed woman who had silently appeared next to their table. "You're _dead!"_

"That's been said about _you_ a time or two, tovarisch," she retorted with a smile. "I actually believed it myself until recently... but when I heard you _were_ still around, I thought I might pay you a visit."

Cagalli glanced between the two, and her eyes widened as she caught the look on Kevin's face. Astonishment, and a trace of... fear? No, not quite but definitely more than a little concern... which meant that whoever this woman was, she must be formidable indeed, for Kevin Onishi feared no man.

Apparently, there was a reason he'd never bothered to include women in that statement.

The woman in question shook her head in amusement. "You seem struck speechless, Kevin Ivanovich. Surely my appearance isn't _that_ much a surprise; after all, you've already met one or two others who survived the incident. Of course, I suppose you might've thought me less likely to survive, given my less capable equipment. Still, you really should've allowed for that possibility in your calculations. Or did you truly think you were out of it, and had no need to worry about war and battle any longer?"

"...That's a mistake I'd never make, Voyevoda," Kevin replied, finally finding his voice. "Besides, Armory One proved that it isn't over, anyway."

Cagalli inhaled sharply. "Voyevoda" was Russian, and meant "warrior chief"... but when used in reference to a woman, it was more accurately translated as "lady knight". It was a title of great respect... a level of respect which Cagalli had never expected Kevin to afford _any_ fellow soldier. He considered himself the best, with only those of his own kind even approaching his ability, and certainly none surpassing it... but it seemed there was one person he _did _consider to be his superior. "Kevin, who is...?"

The woman turned to her. "My apologies, My Lady; rather rude of me to forget you. My name is Arkanian, Natalya Arkanian, codename Delta. Your friend and I knew each other well, once upon a time."

"Indeed we did, Natalya Ivanova," Kevin said slowly, eyes still wide. "Cagalli, this woman was my teacher, a long time ago."

"Your teacher?" Cagalli blinked. "You mean she's-?" She cut herself off, glancing around belatedly to see if anyone was in earshot.

"Da," Arkanian confirmed, unconcerned; she had already checked... otherwise she wouldn't have even been there. "I was the archetype, the first human test subject for the gene therapy and cybernetic augmentation. I was chosen because I was the acknowledged leading combat specialist ZAFT had access to, being an expert at several forms of martial arts, a superb shot with all current firearms and many antiques, a good combat pilot, and someone with experience on a number of battlefields as a mercenary, before I emigrated to the PLANTs. They needed someone like me as the first subject in order to have relevant RNA samples to use on those who would follow. After all, the skills of someone who has _not_ been augmented would be a little use to someone who _has,_ so first they needed to augment someone who was already very good at her job." She shrugged. "Everything worked, after a somewhat uncomfortable recovery time, and I went on to help train twelve more of us, including the most feared of them all."

"It's thanks to her training that I'm still alive," Kevin murmured to Cagalli. "Despite the relative inferiority of her systems, she could throw even me around the salle like I was a feather pillow." He fixed his glowing gaze on his old teacher. "Just what are you doing here, Voyevoda? I don't believe you 'just happened to drop by'; that's not your style."

Delta shrugged. "To be perfectly honest, I've been keeping an eye on you ever since Armory One was attacked. The good Chairman apprized me of the situation, and his suspicion that one of our own was operating under the identity of a baron of Orb, so I kept my eye on you -via hacking into various surveillance systems, of course- until I identified you, then waited for you to reach Earth. Under the circumstances, I thought there were a few things I ought to tell you, so I came down on a shuttle this morning."

"What sort of things?" Kevin said warily, eyes narrow.

"I think we should speak in private for a few moments, if you don't mind," Arkanian said, evading the question for a moment. "Lady Cagalli, could you excuse us briefly?"

Cagalli thought about objecting, but decided quickly that there was no point. Kevin himself still preferred to speak as little about ABADDON as possible, even to her, so it was very likely he'd do it anyway. "...All right," she said reluctantly. "But don't be gone too long. Kevin, you still need to get me back to work before somebody notices."

"I'm sure it won't take long," Kevin assured her. "Natalya?" He stood then, squeezed her shoulder, and walked off with the mysterious "Delta".

_Well,_ Cagalli thought to herself, _at least I don't need to be jealous about it. She's a good fifteen years older than he is... and he's too scared to be interested in that kind of thing right now. But... what _does_ she want?_

The two members of the former ABADDON unit stepped into an alcove deeper within the restaurant, one protected by numerous anti-snooping devices. Like various others within the building, it was meant for just this sort of discussion.

"All right, Delta," Kevin said in a low voice, his tone colder than he'd allowed it to be in front of Cagalli. "What are you doing here, and why contact _me_ after all this time?"

"I should've thought it obvious, Hydra," Arkanian replied. "You know the situation at hand. The theft of the new prototypes might've fallen short of cause for war, but add in the cataclysm that just occurred, and you know as well as I that _both_ sides are out for blood. This cold war is heating up again, fast, and the PLANTs are going to need all the defenders they can get."

"That has nothing to do with me," the Baron replied coldly. "I have my own problems right now, like a genetically-engineered virus that's trying to kill me and an unmitigated bastard of a father who unleashed it in the first place, and probably has even more unsavory plans in the works."

"We all have problems," Delta said quietly. "I had no idea your father was still alive, or that he's trying to kill you, but even if I had, I still would've come here. I'm aware of what the ABADDON Project did to you, and I know you would never consent to return to ZAFT, but there are other ways you could assist."

"Not happening." There was no compromise in Kevin's voice at all as he said those words. "I have no loyalty to the PLANTs, and I never did; Hydra was nothing more than a personality overlay, and you know it. My loyalty isn't even to Orb, really. It's to that girl back there, and there's no chance on this earth that you'll convince me to leave her."

She sighed. "No loyalty to any nation, hm? It seems you've forgotten my teachings, Hydra. But if that is your final answer..." She shrugged. "I won't say that I'll leave this alone forever, Kevin Ivanovich. But I respect you enough to give you time... and if you choose to stay out of the war entirely, I can accept that. But there are some things you need to know if you choose to enter the conflict as a free lance."

His eyes narrowed. "What are those things, Delta?"

Arkanian's voice dropped to a whisper. "ABADDON is not dead," she informed him. "It has been reborn, with eleven new Destroyers at my command. They're not up to the caliber of your team, even in terms of raw ability, but they are more than sufficient to deal with normal troops. They're even sufficient to deal with those with full augmentation, if two or three of them are involved."

Kevin's eyes became jade ice. "Is that a threat, Natalya Ivanova?"

"No. It's a caution... and a warning." She turned to leave, then glanced back over her shoulder. "And one more thing you should remember: Case Ragnarok was declared five years ago... and it has never been rescinded."

Kevin watched her go... and somewhere deep in the halls of his mind, a sleeping tiger stirred, deep in the forest of the night it had lain in for so long...

* * *

By the time Kevin and Cagalli got back to the government offices, the Baron was outwardly back to normal; but Cagalli could tell there was something wrong. _What did that woman say to him?_ she wondered. _What could've gotten to him like this? Unless..._ The only surmise she could come up with was that Arkanian had brought up some painful incident in Kevin's past; perhaps something related to Rachel Carver, whose death still haunted him. Or maybe it was just the reminder of ABADDON itself.

It was hard to be sure, because Cagalli knew as well as anyone that only someone who'd been there could truly understand what Kevin thought and felt about it.

She thought about asking Kevin about it as they arrived at her office, but it went right out of her head when she saw who was waiting for them there. "Alex?" she said in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to say goodbye, actually," Athrun said seriously. "...In the morning, I'm taking a shuttle up to the PLANTs."

Her eyes widened. "Are you sure about that, Alex? You don't have to get involved..."

He nodded. "I know... but I'm worried about the situation up there. That's my homeland, remember, even if I haven't been able to go there much for the last couple of years. I do trust Chairman Durandal, but..."

"I know what you mean, tovarisch," Kevin told him, speaking for the first time. "You can't just sit around doing nothing, huh? I know the feeling... and in your position, I'd the same thing." He hesitated. "Take care of yourself, though, okay? Maybe it's just my past grudge talking... but I'm a little uneasy about ZAFT right now. And if you meet a woman named Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, watch your back. She's even more dangerous than _I_ am, tovarisch."

Athrun blinked. "I didn't know that was possible."

"It is. And I have reason to believe that her reappearance may be somewhat... ominous, shall we say? So watch yourself. And... you might want to mention to the Chairman some of what we talked about the other day. It's something he should be on the lookout for."

"Got it, Kevin." Of course, Athrun had no doubt that his friend had an ulterior motive for informing Durandal of his father's survival and nefarious scheming: the more enemies Baron Onishi had, the less likely he was to escape Kevin's vengeance. Not, of course, that Kevin's official reason didn't also hold true.

"You'd better be careful up there, Alex," Cagalli said quietly. "Kevin and Leona can probably hold up their end while you're gone, but I don't want you taking chances, okay?"

"Don't worry, Cagalli, I'll be careful." Now Athrun's thoughts turned to another matter, and he flicked his gaze briefly to Kevin, before speaking to Cagalli once again. "Look... I don't think I like how Yuna Seiran's been acting lately. Don't you let him split you up, got it? For one thing, Kevin in a bad mood is likely to mean trouble for the entire world, and the colonies."

Cagalli laughed. "You've got a point there. Okay, Alex. We'll do what we can from here; you go see what's going on up in the PLANTs. Between us, maybe we can head off all this."

"I hope so," Athrun said somberly. "Because if we don't, this could be even worse than the last war."

* * *

Shinn Asuka had not been in Orb for two years now... and now that he was back, there was one thing he simply had to do.

The path he strode along was one he remembered very well, from that terrible day. The day when the Earth Alliance had chosen to force Orb out of its neutrality... the day the pride of the Athha family had stopped Orb from simply surrendering, and so had gotten Shinn's parents and sister killed for _nothing._ That azure beam that came down from the skies...

The place where it had happened appeared to be a park now, a place where people went to relax and have fun, instead of a place of death. _People who come here probably have no idea that _anything_ happened here two years ago,_ Shinn thought sadly. _...Can people forget the past so easily?_

It looked as if not everyone had forgotten, however. At the edge of the park, near the water -near, in fact, the very spot where his family had died- now stood a small stone marker, with flowers in front of it; and something told him that the location was not entirely coincidence.

It also wasn't alone. A young man, perhaps two years older than Shinn himself, with brown hair and amethyst eyes, stood next to the marker, gazing out to sea. _I wonder if he lost someone, too..._ Shinn thought to himself.

"Excuse me," he said quietly, walking over, "but is this a memorial for something?"

"I think so," the other replied, "but I'm not sure. It's been here since the war, though, I think." He looked down at the flowers, which on closer inspection were obviously soaked. "It's too bad," the young man went on, almost to himself. "When the debris came down from the sky, the waves were high enough that the flowers were soaked with seawater. Now they'll just wither away and die..."

_Seems appropriate, somehow,_ Shinn thought, hearing those words. _Like a symbol of what's happening now to the entire world..._ "I guess that's a sign of how the world is," he mused aloud. "People will plant beautiful flowers, but in the end someone else will come along and destroy them..."

The brown-haired youth looked at him oddly, but before he could say anything, a pink-haired young woman climbed up the hill to join him. "Hm? Is something the matter?" she asked, glancing curiously at the black-haired soldier.

Shinn shook his head slowly. "No, it's nothing. Sorry for saying strange things." He nodded respectfully, turned, and left... completely unaware that the young man he'd just spoken with was the former pilot of ZGMF-X10A Freedom. Kira Yamato's name was not widely known, but no one would ever forget the machine he flew... just as no one would forget his companion, Lacus Clyne... the Songstress of the PLANTs.

* * *

Unato Ema Seiran's face was appropriately grave as he entered the Chief Representative's office, but inwardly he felt something much different. The news he bore would not be palatable to his nation's leader, he was sure, but that didn't make it bad, as far as he was concerned.

And it just might get that bastard Onishi out of his way at last. The young Baron had the infuriating combination of charisma, intellect, personal lethality, and an utter disregard for the consequences of standing by his principles._ As if a country's foreign policy can be guided by principle,_ Unato thought contemptuously. _They very idea..._

Cagalli looked up as her prime minister walked in. "Yes?" she said, eyes narrow as she took in his expression. "Has there been a new development, Unato?"

He nodded, laying a clipboard on her desk. "Yes, My Lady. It seems that the Atlantic Federation and the other members of the Earth Alliance have issued demands to Supreme Council... and they say that if these demands are not met, they will consider ZAFT a threat to the existence of humanity, and respond accordingly."

Cagalli's eyes went wide. _No... not again...!_ _Those _idiots!_ Why can't they accept that the PLANTs had _nothing_ to do with that incident? One of their ships was _there_, so they _have_ to know...!_

But it didn't matter, she realized sadly. For the Earth Alliance, it never had. They'd trumped up charges as an excuse to invade Orb during the first war, after deliberately provoking the war in the first place, and now they were doing the same thing... all to finally achieve the goal which Muruta Azrael had fought for.

All to finally throw away everything the soldiers of Orb and the Four Ships Alliance had fought and died for.

* * *

In the bowels of the old military base beneath the peaceful facade of Onishi Mansion, a pair of jade eyes glowed in the dimness of the main hangar. The sandy-haired man already knew what the prime minister had revealed, for his own sources had brought the information to his ears even before Unato Ema Seiran learned of it. Which was why he was here, alone, in this dark, gloomy-seeming place.

It was strange, he thought, that he had so much firepower at his disposal, right beneath his own home... and yet he was still so powerless. Everything he had fought for was slipping away... and the past which he had kept buried for so long was coming back to life.

He understood the terrible implications of his teacher's words, understood the explicit threat in the simple codewords "Case Ragnarok". Nothing the woman had said mattered except those two words... and the new ABADDON. Together, they meant he could stay passive for only a little while longer.

Now he stared at a great, winged mobile suit, its own jade eyes dark. Tall, proud, with tapering wings, a V-shaped, crest-like communications antenna, and claws on the forearms, it was Death personified, from the CIWS in its head to the machine cannons in its shoulders... and the immensely powerful double-barreled rifle held in one hand. It was black with crimson trim, its phase-shift armor active even now as its nuclear reactor waited only to power up its _true_ source of energy... as, off to either side, a row of blocky machines with reverse-jointed legs, old fashioned radomes on the left "arms", and railguns on the right, sat in even deeper gloom, their lines antique but still lethally functional.

"It's almost time, my friend," he murmured to the deadly machine. "Two years we've been stuck here, denying our true natures... soon, we'll have no choice but to return to our calling. And you, Nemesis, will be my sword, as you were in your previous form. When it all begins, you and I will be there... and no one will ever forget your might."

Then Kevin Onishi turned and strode off into the darkness.

* * *

Author's note: Cagalli and her companions have finally returned to Orb... but they still have no time to rest. The danger is now in the realm of politics, where Kevin Walker was once a stranger, and even now is but a visitor. War comes once again, and the sleeping tiger will soon awaken...

Well, I seem to have actually gotten this ready in less than two weeks for a change; about bloody time I got back into the groove. Well, I daresay things are going to be getting very interesting soon; and don't think I've run out of twists yet. Till then, though, let me know what you think of this chapter. -Solid Shark


	9. Chapter 9: A Time for War

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"There are soldiers, and there are warriors; the distinction between the two usually escapes those unfamiliar with the art of war, and it is a subtle one, but it is nonetheless very important. That's something that I have a great deal of personal knowledge about._

_"Originally, I was a soldier in the Zodiac Alliance of Freedom Treaty. An unwilling one, to be sure, but a soldier nonetheless. It was there that I began to acquire an appreciation for just being a soldier _was;_ about teamwork, obedience, and, perhaps most importantly, discipline. There are places in the military even for those who lack team spirit, or have difficulty with authority. Some of the most effective Special Forces operatives you'll meet fail to meet those two criteria. But a soldier who lacks _discipline,_ who is given to letting his emotions control him in battle, has no business being in the military, and cannot truly call himself a soldier at all. He cannot even call himself a warrior, which is perhaps what someone lacking in team spirit but nonetheless possessing discipline might be called._

_"This is why I haven't approved of Shinn Asuka from the moment I met him on the ZAFT warship _Minerva._ About the first words I heard out of his mouth showed that his temper was a ferocious one, like mine... but without the controls that hold mine in check. His hatred of Orb and its nobility borders on the pathological, and if his actions during _Minerva_'s escape from Orb were any indication, he is not above unleashing that hatred in battle. The results then were spectacular; another time, they would likely have gotten him killed._

_"Perhaps I should explain a little background here. A soldier is someone who is obedient to his superiors in the chain of command, and works well with others; he fights because he has to, and lays down his weapons when the battle is over. A warrior, on the other hand, is often best when fighting alone, with minimal direction from above, and unlike the soldier, his very life is defined by the field of battle. Of those traits, Shinn Asuka does manage to obey orders... usually. But his life is only defined by his enemies; his past seems to have left him nothing but the battlefield. Overriding his usual respect for authority, however, is his clear lack of emotional control. If your opponent is of choleric temper, provoke him; that is a tenet by which I live, and it is one thing Asuka cannot understand, because he himself is possessed of that temper. Provoke him, and he will easily become angry, and angry people make mistakes._

_"That is why, though in terms of raw skill we may be very similar, Shinn Asuka will never have what it takes to kill me..."_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_Wonderful stuff, ABADDON stealth technology,_ the armored soldier known as Hyperion thought, staring at the building only a few hundred meters distant. _Without it, I never would've made it down from orbit undetected; with it, Kevin doesn't suspect my presence even when I park a strike fighter only a kilometer away from his house._

The Excalibur strike fighter had come down two nights previously, slipping through Orb's radar, optical, and thermal detection systems with almost absurd ease. Now it was hidden in a small cave not far from Onishi Mansion, within easy reach of the place. Since the current Baron Onishi clearly had no plans to leave the country anytime soon, Hyperion had decided to set up camp on the very island he lived upon, and keep watch on him from there.

At other times, the armored soldier probably wouldn't have bothered; it was clear just from scans of the mansion's electromagnetic activity that ABADDON's former commander had surrounded himself with enough nasty surprises that no normal intruder could possibly harm him. Unfortunately, Hyperion had recently become aware of activity from _other_ augmented troops, ones loyal to ZAFT... which meant that the threat might be far greater than Hydra realized.

_On the other hand, _Hyperion mused, _Kevin's clearly found out _something_ is up._ That much was evident from how cautious his movements had become since the soldier's first day on planet. Something he'd learned had spooked him, and he now traveled with his car's AKWES system constantly online... and Hyperion had detected an electromagnetic signature consistent with a Mark XV railgun in the DeLorean's backseat. How he had gotten it in there was a little unclear, given its weight, but the soldier suspected Kevin's cybernetic arm had been involved.

Exactly _what_ was going on was still unclear, but Hyperion suspected it had something to do with an implant signature the soldier's armor had picked up not long after landing. If Delta was back in the game, there was no telling what might happen... but whatever it was, it would probably be happening soon.

_As soon as war begins,_ Hyperion thought. _Then Delta will have the fog of war to cover her actions... and an excuse. Perhaps she presented him with an ultimatum... Case Ragnarok, maybe?_

It didn't really matter, though. Whatever happened, Hyperion would be watching Kevin's back, to repay him for all the suffering he'd endured without his comrades even knowing about it.

* * *

_Kira must be getting really confused by now,_ Kevin thought idly, gazing at the screen covering one wall of the command center. _I keep disappearing, and he can't figure out why..._ For the past two years, he'd been careful to limit his visits to the underground military base, in large part because Kira had no idea the base even existed, but now he had no choice but to spend more and more time there. The situation was getting worse, and he needed to be ready at a moment's notice for anything that might occur.

When Kevin heard the door open behind him, he didn't bother to rise from his chair or even turn his head. "Thought you'd be busy working on _Minerva,_ Murrue," he said quietly.

"I just got off-shift," Murrue replied, walking up beside him. "When I got here, Kira said you'd disappeared again, so I thought I should check on you." She shook her head. "You know, one of these days you're going to have to cut back on these trips, or outright tell him. He's going to get suspicious pretty soon, and he _knows_ you."

"True," Kevin acknowledged. "Don't have much choice at the moment, though. There's a lot going on... and I've got some hard choices to make." He fished a cigarette out of his pocket, lit up, and leaned back with a sigh.

Murrue settled into the chair next to his, and raised an eyebrow. She had no idea when or where he'd picked up the habit -before the night he'd come back, she'd never seen him smoke- but it appeared to be relaxing him now... which was clearly a good thing, from his demeanor. "What kind of choices?" she asked gently.

"Hard ones," he repeated, gazing at the display; it was currently a weather map of the western hemisphere, which would, among other things, allow him to gauge when the Earth Alliance could send men and materiel to space. "...I ran into someone the other day," he went on, almost to himself. "Someone I thought died a long time ago. Her name is Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, and she's the only person in the world I'm afraid of."

She looked at him curiously. "I didn't know you were afraid of _anyone,_ Kevin. I mean, you're the fastest, strongest person alive, with more combat experience than almost anyone..."

"Almost is the operative word," Kevin informed her. "She used to be a mercenary, and a good one, before emigrating to the PLANTs and joining ZAFT. She was the first human test subject for the Destroyer augmentation... and my teacher. She could throw any one of us, even me, around like rag dolls." He idly blew smoke into the air; a wasted gesture, given the base's air filtration systems. "I met her at The Western Eating Parlor the other day, and she had a couple of interesting things to say... both of which are very, very bad news as far as I'm concerned."

"Things that you don't want Cagalli or Kira to know about, right?" Murrue said shrewdly. "I notice you've been being even more closemouthed than usual lately."

"Yeah, well, I've got reason. First of all, Delta told me that she's reconstituted the ABADDON unit, under her command. The troops aren't as good as my people were, but with augmentation, they're still more than enough to handle anything the Earth Forces can through at them."

She closed her eyes. "No, I don't suppose that _is_ good news. But... what's the other thing she mentioned?"

Kevin smiled humorlessly. "Oh, nothing much. She just gave me an interesting choice: stay out of the war completely, join in on ZAFT's side... or face the consequences of Case Ragnarok."

Murrue frowned. "Case Ragnarok? I... don't think you've ever mentioned that before, Kevin. What is it?"

"'In the event of a mutiny by one or more members of the Special Forces Unit ABADDON against rightful authority,'" he quoted, "'Case Ragnarok will be declared automatically. Under the conditions of Case Ragnarok, until the situation is resolved or higher authority rescinds the order, any Destroyer is to be viewed as a clear and present danger to the PLANTs, and all ZAFT forces are instructed to terminate the subject on sight.'" He slowly shook his head. "In other words, tovarisch, my choices are to do nothing, side with people I was never loyal to in the first place, or die. As if I didn't have enough problems."

She nodded slowly. "I can see your problem," she murmured. "...So, what's your choice?"

"Devil if I know. At the moment, there's still a minute chance that it won't come into play at all; if Durandal can convince those bigoted idiots in the Earth Alliance not to nuke them or anything, it'll be fine. If not..." Kevin shrugged. "With ABADDON rebuilt, Delta _has_ the ability to carry out her threat... and even if she didn't, enforcing Case Ragnarok makes all of ZAFT my enemy."

"But you'd never even consider joining forces with ZAFT again," Murrue mused, "at least not on any lasting basis... and given the course Orb politics are starting to take, it sounds like staying out of it won't be an option, either. So... is there any way you can defend yourself? As you said, those new Destroyers won't be as good as you, but with eleven of them, along with this Arkanian woman... not to mention regular ZAFT forces." She frowned in thought. "Has Prometheus Unchained managed to reverse-engineer anything you'd find useful?"

"Some," he admitted. "Some ideas were only theoretical even from ABADDON's perspective, of course; we were light-years ahead of everyone else, but we weren't working miracles. Oracle was always one to take the long view, though, so maybe in a few decades... But for now, yes, we've made progress, and not all of it from ABADDON's research. For one thing, I've managed to resurrect the old Metal Storm concept, which was apparently lost in the Reconstruction War. Several early prototypes were stolen by Carter along with the Justice, but we're set up to manufacture them now. Also, we have _Prometheus_ and _Icarus,_ along with _Dominion,_ and the new mobile suits... like Nemesis and Foxhound." He met her gaze steadily. "If the situation escalates, I'll not hesitate to bring Nemesis to full combat status, Sis."

"You know that's risky," she cautioned. "Nemesis' reactor is only the second prototype not to instantly explode, remember... and if something goes wrong, you're risking turning most of Orb into a giant ball of energy. Couldn't you at least rely on the fission reactor instead?"

Kevin shook his head. "You know how energy-intensive the new model twin buster rifle is, Murrue; and that the third setting can _only_ be used in conjunction with the new reactor. Nuclear reactors simply don't have the output needed to power Nemesis at full efficiency. Besides, there _are_ failsafes, you know; if they work properly, the reactor should shut down before it can destroy an area any larger than a hundred meters. I know it's a risk," he added, raising a hand to forestall her reply, "and I know 'should' isn't something anyone likes to hear in contingency planning. But it's the best I can do... and the real threat isn't from mobile suits, anyway. It's from augmented soldiers, particularly if the Earth Alliance should get hold of the technology. And that _would_ happen, Murrue, if any of Delta's new brood should fall on the battlefield." He closed his eyes. "It's something I've started to think about the last year or so: if _any_ of the secrets behind my abilities leak, the result could be chaos. Leaving aside the effect it could have on the civilian world, there's the small matter that it might lead to both sides using cyborg shock troopers as their 'trump cards'. Can you imagine what that would be like?"

Murrue shivered at the thought. "They couldn't mass-produce augmented troops," she murmured, "given the sheer expense involved; and, for that matter, individuals who can tolerate it are rare enough among Coordinators, let alone Naturals. But even a couple of hundred on either side... that's a very frightening thought, Brother."

"It's also why I'm accelerating research and development of anti-Destroyer weapons," he said with a nod, "now that I know ABADDON's been revived. There are a couple of toys ABADDON designed, such as the Mark I particle beam weapon, that can take out even one of us with relative ease. For that matter, even a battlesuit would have difficulty standing up to a portable railgun. But the best answer is probably EMP. Even with modern shielding, devices as complex as cybernetic augmentation are still terribly vulnerable to an electromagnetic pulse, which is another reason Destroyers would be best used as shock troops; smaller numbers means less chance of being caught where EMP can be used, and special forces units tend to be in and out pretty fast."

"Still, it explains why you're turning into a nervous wreck," Murrue remarked with a slow nod. "...And I suppose this is why you've been letting Leona handle most of the guard duties the last few days? Because you don't want Cagalli to know what's going on?"

"Pretty much," Kevin confirmed. "She's having enough trouble with the Seirans as it is; add this to the things she has to worry about, and even she might start to falter under the load. Besides... it's safer this way. I'm well aware that Natalya Ivanova would never order her people to injure those with me -for all that she's being unreasonable right now, she's no terrorist- but... well, accidents happen, especially when augmented strength and weaponry is involved."

"You do realize that you may be making things even harder on her by becoming so distant," she warned. "You've always been the rock she could lean on, Kevin; you take that away, and who does she have to support her? Kira has to be careful, because of the circumstances of the last war and because he's a Coordinator who's known to the Earth Forces. Athrun isn't even on planet anymore... and her father died two years ago. Who else can she turn to?"

"I don't know," he admitted. "But she can't lean on _anyone_ if Blue Cosmos or ABADDON blow her to bits in an attempt to kill me." He shrugged. "It's not as if I don't see her at all, Murrue; I'm still handling some of the guard duty, and it's not like I can avoid the Cabinet meetings even if I wanted to. Besides, even in our official lives, we're both pretty busy right now. The only change is that I'm being a little more careful; we're already apart more of the time than I'd like."

"Hm..." Murrue gazed at him a few moments longer, then sighed. "I hope you know what you're doing, Kevin. I know you're better informed about the political situation than I am, but still..." She shrugged. "Kind of makes you wish for the old days, doesn't it? Back on the _Archangel?"_

Kevin smiled wistfully. "Yeah... back then, all we had to worry about was staying alive; fighting is black and white, without any of the double-talk that permeates politics. There's you, and there's the enemy, and that's all there is to it."

"Of course," she said, thinking aloud, "if things go as badly as we fear, we might be _back_ to the old days before long."

"True enough." He stood abruptly, and put out his cigarette. "That's why I'm going to go make sure Nemesis is ready for activation at a moment's notice... and put the Rex units on standby."

* * *

Lying prone on the top of a crater's rim, the azure mobile suit watched the activity at the Earth Alliance's Arzachel Base through a sniper scope. _Hm..._ the sniper thought, watching the flurry of preparations. _Looks like the negotiations between Earth and the PLANTs are doomed even as they begin. Pathetic, really... I'd have thought they'd choose a better method. Really, launching yet another nuclear attack? How unimaginative._

The Arzachel Base had replaced Ptolemaeus following its destruction during the war, and it was evident they'd managed to move at least some of Ptolemaeus' nuclear storage prior to the blast from GENESIS, for the sniper thought it unlikely they could've built this many _new_ nuclear weapons in the time since the war ended, given the prohibition against nuclear arms. A few, perhaps, not so many. Not covertly.

In any case, she was not impressed. Evidently, it hadn't occurred to the Earth Forces that the PLANTs might've learned something from the _last_ two attempts to nuke them into oblivion. _You're going to have to try something new this time, you bastards... you can't succeed yet again with the trick you used to destroy Rachel's and Alec's home._

Like Alec, the woman had an almost pathological hatred for nuclear weapons, largely because the Destroyers had been so close-knit it was almost impossible _not_ to feel something for the destruction of the home of one or more of their members.

Still, she found _this_ to be almost amusing. _Alec will get a kick out of this one,_ she thought to herself. _Might be enough to amuse even him, and _he_ hasn't laughed in five years._ She considered reporting the fruitless preparations to her old comrade, but then decided against it. There was a better idea...

Smiling faintly, she activated her radio implant. "It begins, my commander," she murmured, more than a little amused by the consternation she detected at the other end of the link. "The war that sprang from the last war has begun at last; negotiations are nothing but window dressing now. In a matter of days, conflict will begin anew, and history will repeat. And yet... will you be there to see it, I wonder? You chose to absent yourself from your true world for the past two years; and if you choose to remain at peace, perhaps none can blame you. But lives hang in the balance, my commander, perhaps the lives of the entire world. Will you remain in shadow, denying your past... or will you take up arms once again?"

_"Who _is_ this?" _her old commander's thoroughly irritated voice demanded. _"What do you want? What are you_ waiting_ for?"_

"A call, my commander," the soldier who had once been a Destroyer replied simply. "When the time is right, you'll know what I mean."

The she cut the link, and grinned to herself. The fact that she might well be helping bring her commander back to his old self would've been satisfying enough; the way she must be confusing him in the process brought it to a whole new level. For someone who hadn't had much amusement since the cataclysmic end to the ABADDON Project, finally succeeding in perplexing a man who had always seemed to have all the answers was _most_ amusing.

* * *

"The situation is grave," Gilbert Durandal said heavily, speaking to the gathered Supreme Council of the PLANTs. "The Earth Alliance is apparently choosing to blame _us_ for the events that took place in the Debris Belt, and the colony drop itself. Therefore, President Copeland of the Atlantic Federation is now demanding that we provide compensation for financial and human losses, disarm our militia, and that all members of the Supreme Council immediately resign."

"That's outrageous!" the representative from Maius City protested, "They're blaming _us_ for what happened, when we were the ones who tried to _stop_ it? And those terms are no better than what they offered Orb two years ago, before _they_ were invaded!"

"Worse, actually," the Junius representative said grimly. "Orb, at least, was never asked to give compensation for anything. On the whole, however, I agree."

"Perhaps we should mobilize ZAFT in preparation for our defense," the Martius representative put in. "Surely an attack cannot be far behind, if they're putting forth these unreasonable demands now."

"I agree," the December City representative concurred. "We must take appropriate precautions, especially in light of the Earth Alliance's past actions."

Durandal sighed. "That's a dangerous path," he cautioned. "Escalating the tension in that manner would just be repeating history. We need to work toward a peaceful resolution..."

"The forces at Arzachel Base _are_ mobilizing," the Junius representative reminded him. "Do you really believe they intend for a peaceful resolution, Chairman? I understand your opinion on the matter, but I believe we have no choice but to mobilize in our defense, to counter any potential attack from the Arzachel forces."

The Chairman closed his eyes, visibly considering the situation. The other members of the Council waited as patiently as they could; they had influence and power, but in the end it was Gilbert Durandal who would make the final decision.

The question was... would he listen to his own opinion, or that of his Council?

"I believe mobilizing ZAFT at this time would be a grave escalation of tension," Durandal said at last. "I don't believe that to be the best thing we could do. I would far prefer to continue negotiations to bring a peaceful end to this situation. However..." His gaze took in the entire Supreme Council. "However, memories of the Bloody Valentine Tragedy are still fresh in the minds of our citizens. This may not be the wisest course, but it's what we're going to do. We _will_ mobilize ZAFT."

"Thank you, Chairman," the Junius representative said quietly, remembering the nuclear fire that had once engulfed one of the PLANTs in his own jurisdiction.

"Don't thank me yet," Durandal said wearily. "I think that if we have another war now, the terrorists who attempted to drop Junius Seven on Earth will achieve exactly the goal they sought..."

* * *

In a dark office -the lighting kept low because its sole occupant had far better eyes than humans were issued at birth- Natalya Ivanova Arkanian communed with her computer via neural link. She wasn't at all certain she liked the information she was gathering; the foreign policy situation was quite bad enough without adding her current information about her old students to the mix.

_Simon Priest, codename Cerberus, KIA, ABADDON HQ,_ she noted, going over the records. _Erica Hawke, codename Scylla, KIA, ABADDON HQ... that could be a problem, since her sisters are both on the _Minerva..._Charles Evans, codename Talos, KIA, ABADDON HQ. Rachel Carver, codename Medusa, KIA, ABADDON HQ. Michael Carnehan, codename Kraken, KIA, Banadiya, African Community. Tanya Coleson, codename Harpy, MIA. Mark DeVries, codename Chimera, MIA. Tom Aldrich, codename Manticore, MIA. Alan Clark, codename Minotaur, MIA. Tessa Dortmund, codename Gorgon, MIA. Alec King, codename Basilisk, MIA. And Kevin Walker, codename Hydra... AWOL._

Originally, Hydra himself had been her only concern; Delta had believed the other MIAs to be dead in the nuclear explosion. Now, she wasn't so sure. First was the intervention of the mysterious, armored soldier using the alias Hyperion, at Armory One and in the Debris Belt. And then there was anomalous sniper fire during the battle over Junius Seven... sniper fire that was so precise, from such a distant point of origin, that it almost had to be a Destroyer.

_So how many?_ Arkanian wondered. _How many of the First Stage subjects still live? Kraken survived long enough to lose his mind and die at Hydra's hands on Earth... and now at least two others have appeared. Could there be more? And if there are... whom would they side with?_

Once she wouldn't have doubted their allegiance to ZAFT; now she had some concern about the matter. Kevin had so far refused to return to the fold... and one thing she recalled about his comrades was that they were all mavericks. They took no orders from higher authority; only Hydra and Medusa could command their obedience, so all orders had to be relayed through them.

That left the glaring question: would they return to ZAFT when summoned... or obey Kevin Walker's call, and face Case Ragnarok along with him? If they did, Arkanian was less than certain Case Ragnarok could even be carried out. Her new team was good, but the old had all been genetically superior, with better augmentation and, by now, far more experience at the fine art of staying alive. Any of them who'd managed to stay out of sight for the past five years and still remain alive would be a very dangerous adversary, indeed. All of them together...

Delta almost shivered. She had no doubts of her ability to handle one or even two of the old ABADDON all by herself, but beyond that...

_My only recourse may be DEALT,_ she admitted to herself, hating the very thought. _I wish it could be otherwise, but against people such as them, drastic measures must sometimes be taken._ It was, she knew, fortuitous indeed that she had managed to download a copy of the DEALT command codes before the destruction of the ABADDON lab; now it might be her only chance at making things right.

* * *

"Just like old times, huh, Yzak?" Dearka mused, as he and his commander stepped off the shuttle onto the deck of the ZAFT carrier _Gondwana._ He wore red; his companion wore white. "Another year, another attack by the Earth Alliance. Yep, just like the old days."

"This is no time for jokes, Dearka," Yzak retorted. "This is serious. And besides," he added, walking slightly ahead, "if this were the old days, we wouldn't be _here,_ we'd be on _Dominion,_ getting ready to try and survive one of Captain Walker's nuclear stunts." He shook his head. "What _is_ it with that guy and nuclear bombs, anyway? And that new stuff he's been cooking up..."

"Keep your voice down, Yzak," Dearka warned, motioning with his chin toward the other ZAFT troops boarding the ship. "We're not even supposed to _think_ about that in public..."

His commander snorted, but kept his peace; he respected his own former CO that much. "Still," he muttered, "I can't deny I'd feel a little better if Stormhawk were out here. Be reassuring to see a three-hundred-meter beam smash through the enemy."

"He doesn't do that anymore," Dearka reminded him. "Well... not usually, anyway. But what makes you think Cagalli would let him fly combat anymore in the first place?"

Another snort from Yzak. "What makes you think she could stop him? For one thing, the way things are going down there right now, Captain Walker won't be _safe_ in Orb much longer. For another..." He shook his head. "You know as well as I do what he's been like lately."

Dearka sighed. "Yeah, that's true. Even Cagalli might concede that's the catharsis he needs if he's not gonna snap outright." He shook his head. "Sometimes I gotta wonder how he keeps it together at all. An ordinary guy would've snapped after the _first_ memory wipe, let alone the second... or the brainwashing, or the nuclear explosions."

"Probably," Yzak agreed, then tossed his head. "But it doesn't really matter right now, anyway. The Captain isn't here; we are. So how are we going to _win_ this one?"

* * *

Athrun stepped off his shuttle, and gazed about Aprilius One for the first time in two long years. _It's almost like being home again,_ he thought, taking a deep breath of the colony's air. As was typical of the giant space stations, there was no trace of stale air; they were large enough to boast their own mini-ecosystems, of a sort, which kept the air as fresh as on Earth. _I'd almost forgotten what it was like..._

The last time he'd been here in person had been the day he'd gone to confront his father about his plans for the war. He'd been shot that day, by Patrick Zala, and would've been killed were it not for the intervention of Martin DaCosta, his old friend Kevin, and the armored assassin known as Invictus.

The time before that had been scarcely better. It had been in the wake of Operation Spit Break's disastrous failure, with the PLANTs still reeling both from that and from the apparent betrayal by both Siegel and Lacus Clyne. That day, Athrun's father had informed him that Lacus was the enemy, and no longer his fiancé... and answered Athrun's questions about ABADDON by confirming that he had personally authorized both it and Kevin's participation. Then he'd as much as told Athrun outright that he was to kill Kevin Walker, blithely unconcerned by the ridiculous notion of a lingering friendship.

All in all, Athrun's memories of Aprilius One were decidedly mixed, but, considering that he hadn't dared come here since the end of the war, he decided that it was, after all, good to be back.

"Excuse me, but would you be Alex Dino?"

Athrun glanced up, realizing abruptly that he'd been caught up in his own thoughts, and saw what was clearly a government representative coming toward him. "That's right," he responded. "Just arrived from Orb. May I ask what's going on?"

"Chairman Durandal asked me to brief you," the representative informed him. "The situation is grave, as you're undoubtedly aware. The Earth Alliance, more specifically the Atlantic Federation, has made a number of demands of the PLANTs. Chairman Durandal refuses to give in, of course, and he _is_ seeking a diplomatic solution to this matter, but..."

Athrun nodded slowly. "It doesn't look good," he murmured. "It's like three years ago, when the last war began... except now they know how to circumvent the Neutron-jammers, and can attack with even greater force..."

"Yes. The Chairman believes it can be stopped, but matters are still less than ideal." The man shrugged. "There are rumors of someone else preparing to intervene, but that's how things stand right now."

"I see..." Athrun nodded to himself again. "Sir, I'd like to meet with Chairman Durandal as soon as possible. That's why I've come; there are... things I need to discuss with him."

The representative nodded. "I believe that can be arranged, Mister Dino. It may take a little time, but I believe the Chairman also wishes to meet with you."

"Thank you."

Turning away, Athrun smiled to himself, just a little. _Another faction, huh? You're still up to your old tricks, Kevin... but is there anything even you can do here? Whatever it is you've got, it obviously isn't ready yet or you'd have used it when Junius Seven fell. Unless..._ His eyes narrowed in sudden thought. _What if there's someone _else _out there?_

In this time and place, it was impossible to be sure. Kevin Walker's own long-silent past was awakening; the relics of the past who were reviving had their own agendas, but they seemed mostly in accord with Kevin's own. Where they might appear... was anyone's guess.

_But I know one thing: this war is going to be a lot more complicated than the last.  
_

* * *

The man known as Lord Djibril impatiently tapped the arm of his chair as he waited for the connection to the Atlantic Federation's capital to go through. _I need a status report,_ he thought irritably. _I know that bastard Tiger can't be involved, but that doesn't help me know what's going _

right.

The Atlantic Federation's leader, President Copeland, finally appeared on Djibril's communications screen. "Yes, Lord Djibril?" he said politely.

"We've no time for pleasantries, President Copeland," Djibril said impatiently. "There's something I need to know: how long until our forces begin the attack on the PLANTs?"

"We're launching our ships from Arzachel now," the president replied, "but we can't just rush into this. There are still too many nations opposed to the Atlantic Federation's policies..."

Djibril snorted. "You're making excuses, Mister President. Do you really believe there's anyone who can truly oppose us? The world is full of squabbling nations who can bark all they want but have no bite." He shook his head. "I think you're just afraid of Orb, Mister President."

"There _is_ precedent," Copeland protested. "Two years ago, the defense they put up... and you yourself said the Crimson Tiger resides there!"

"The Crimson Tiger is not an issue, so long as we don't repeat my predecessor's mistakes." Djibril shook his head again. "The world is a system, Mister President, which must be managed like a garden. Like any garden, weeds will appear from time to time to mar its beauty, and those weeds are what oppose LOGOS' plans. They must be destroyed, so that no one can oppose us... and Kevin Walker is no more than a weed. Forget him, Mister President; we'll deal with him in time. What we need to deal with _now_ is the PLANTs... so get that fleet moving, Mister President."

* * *

High up on the mountain of Do'gyaling in Tibet, a young man with sandy hair and softly glowing jade eyes stood outside a small house, staring up at the night sky. The event he'd feared for two years was finally coming to pass; he could see that with his own eyes, as his enhanced gaze focused on the points of light he knew to be space colonies. "It would be a beautiful sight, if it weren't so terrible," he murmured. "History repeats..."

"John?" The youth's head turned as the home's other occupant, a black-haired woman with amethyst eyes, came out to join him. "It's starting."

John Tyler, known on the battlefield as the assassin Invictus, nodded unhappily. "I know, love. I can see it from here."

Natarle Badgiruel, late of the Earth Alliance Forces and executive officer of the rogue Mobile Assault Ship_ Dominion,_ shook her head. "That's not what I mean. President Copeland of the Atlantic Federation just made a worldwide broadcast. He said that the PLANTs have refused to give in to the demands Earth has made on them, and continue to harbor the terrorist group responsible for the fall of Junius Seven. As such, they constitute a clear and present danger to the world... so the Earth Alliance is declaring war on them. The first strike is scheduled to begin..."

"Right now." John nodded. "With my augmentation, I can even see it... Those bastards. Two years of peace, and then they go back to trying to wipe each other out again..."

Natarle nodded unwillingly. "There's no way to stop it, is there?"

He sighed. "No. Certainly nothing you or I could do would have any effect; and I doubt Kevin can do much of anything, either. Even with everything we've been doing up at Artemis, we don't have the forces to take on the entire Earth Forces space fleet."

"All this because a few ex-ZAFT pilots trapped in their own pasts couldn't forgive Earth." She shook her head. "What they... what _we_ did, in the early days of the war, was inexcusable. What the Earth Forces did toward the _end _of the war was inexcusable. But couldn't they see that dropping a colony on Earth's surface would just make things _worse?"_

John shrugged. "Who can understand the minds of fanatics, mate? I can't." He laid a hand on her shoulder. "It could've been worse, though. Tsunamis, yes, and the sky's beginning to change from all the debris tossed into the air, but at least we survived, eh?"

"Yeah. Yeah, we did." Their mountain home had been lucky; a settlement farther down on Do'gyaling had been wiped out by a chunk of rubble from Junius Seven, but they had escaped unscathed. And they wouldn't have, Natarle knew, if ZAFT hadn't made a valiant effort to stop the attack in the first place. "And now they're being blamed for it," she murmured, "instead of thanked..."

"It was inevitable, mate," John said softly, easily following her train of thought. "Sooner or later they'd have just found another excuse; all this did was give them a ready-made pretext faster than they could've come up with one themselves."

She nodded, leaning against him; like the man he'd been cloned from, he'd grown quite tall in the time since the war, enough so that the armor which lay in storage within the house was actually a replacement set, constructed at Artemis Base.

"What I'm wondering, though," he said thoughtfully, "is what _we_ do now. There's nothing we can do about _this_ situation, of course, but later..."

"...We'll probably be getting a recall order within a few weeks," Natarle said quietly. "You can be sure Kevin will have put Artemis on standby for Himmelkrieg; he must be even more concerned than we are, considering that he has to deal with Orb politics at the same time."

"Yeah." John frowned, and scratched the back of his head. "I wish we knew more about what's happening over there, though; being isolated like this had been wonderful for R&R, but sometimes it's a bloody nuisance. The last we heard from Kevin didn't sound very good; I 'remember' the Seiran family, and not with kindness. With Unato Ema Seiran as prime minister, he has all too much power... and that slimy brat Yuna has a little more access to Cagalli than I'd like."

Natarle glanced at him curiously; she knew that, at one time, the assassin had been fully as devoted to Cagalli as Kevin himself. "Does it still hurt?" she asked quietly. "Knowing about them?"

He knew exactly what she was referring to; they'd discussed the matter in a general way once before, during the war. "Not really," he said after a moment's thought. "It did at first, yeah... but let's face it, Natarle: I started out as an exact, carbon copy of Kevin Walker, down to the tiniest detail of mind and memory. But in the years since I was made, we've lived very different lives, and that means I'm not quite the same as he is anymore. I remember everything Cagalli and I -well, Cagalli and Kevin- shared, but... it's not _my_ memory, Natarle, not really. The better I understand that, the more I understand that I really am my own person now. I've got my own life, my own path... my own family." He smiled down at her. "And nothing's going to take that away from either of us, even if the whole world explodes around us."

"Which is probably going to happen," Natarle remarked dryly, nodding at the sky. "But... I appreciate it. It's just something I've wondered, over the last couple years."

"Only natural, considering the circumstances of my genesis." John shrugged. "Now, though... now it's the future you and I need to worry about, not the past."

He turned his augmented gaze back to the sky, and nodded inwardly. _Yes, the future is our concern... and that future is being born up there right now, on the field of battle._

The two of them would not be the only ones watching the skies that fateful night.

* * *

Leona stood alone on the balcony in her private quarter that overlooked the ocean, and gazed up at the night sky, ignoring the slight chill the breeze brought in. She had watched the broadcast and was relieved that Lacus and the children had already gone to sleep, so they wouldn't be troubled by the dire news.

"…will this endless waltz never cease?" Leona asked herself silently as she kept her gaze at the stars.

* * *

_It begins,_ the sniper mused, watching from behind a drifting rock as the Earth Forces and ZAFT fleets moved toward each other, deploying mobile suits and readying their weapons for the confrontation. Missiles quickly began to fly from old, obsolete GINNs, and battle began.

"Some said it was inevitable," the sniper mused, opening the Destroyer radio linkages once again... this time, _all _of them, not just the command link. "The peace was but a passing dream; war came again, as implacable as ever in its pursuit of destruction. The crucial time has arrived, the decision must be made. What of it, my comrades? Shall we fade away into obscurity, as we deserve? Or shall we take hold of our destiny with our own hands, and fight to redeem our sins? It is a time for war, and there is no more time to dither. With war upon us, we must decide, and _my_decision is made. Arise, if you will, for fell deeds await! Before the dawn, blood will run, and our choices will decide the fate of the world!"

This time, the consternation on the other end of the link -from at least three separate point sources- was an enjoyment experienced by only a part of the sniper's mind. The rest was entirely focused on the battle, and the azure machine boosted out of hiding, unlimbered the heavy sniper rifle, and took aim on the distant foes, as targeting protocols within the pilot's mind flickered to life, fast as thought.

The call to come to her commander's side had not been uttered, but the sniper would not stand idle today. If she couldn't go to her commander's aid, at least she could defend her homeland... the homeland one of her family had already died for.

Targeting data clicked neatly into place, and a burst of emerald light erupted from the rifle's barrel.

* * *

"Yzak Joule, launching!" Yzak snapped out, his Slash-equipped ZAKU Phantom flashing out of _Gondwana_'s catapult. "Let's stop this now, before they get any closer to the PLANTs!"

"Dearka Elsman, launching," Dearka echoed, flying out to meet his friend and commander in his Gunner-equipped ZAKU Warrior. "This battle's only begun, Yzak," he added. "They're nowhere near the PLANTs yet; now let's make sure they _never_ get that far."

Yzak grunted in agreement, and opened up with his back-mounted Gatlings on a Dagger L that strayed too close, tearing it apart with the hail of bullets. "At least they're only Daggers," he said, unimpressed. "No sign of the three machines they stole."

"I'm not complaining," Dearka retorted. "Not that it'd matter if they _did_ send them; we proved at Junius Seven that we can take them down." He shook his head, triggering a burst of red-orange fire from his cannon at a target of his own, even as an emerald dart flashed past him. "What bothers _me_ is that they're still using variants of the old Strike Dagger design; you'd think they'd have come up with _something_ new over the past couple years, you know?"

"Yeah," his friend agreed darkly. "This isn't like them. Man, I wish I knew what Captain Walker did with the Duel... I could really use that thing right now." He ducked to one side, evading a beam saber aimed for his Phantom's torso, and brought his beam rifle around. Teeth bared in a snarl, he pulled the trigger-

-And his shot melted some of the debris which had, moments before, been a Dagger L, before the burst of powerful emerald energy that had come out of nowhere immolated it.

"Where'd that come from?" Yzak demanded, glancing around in annoyed confusion. "Who fired that-?"

"Behind us, Yzak," Dearka told him, gesturing with his ZAKU's cannon. "I don't know who or what that thing is, but-"

Yzak turned, and his eyebrows went up at the sight of the azure mobile suit that hurtled across space toward the battlezone, firing a heavy sniper rifle as it came. "I don't recognize that model," he muttered, almost to himself. "Who could it be?" Thrusting backwards, he swept out his beam axe into a flashing cut that caught a Dagger L in the torso, hesitated, and then tore its way all the way through, blasting the hapless Earth Forces machine in half.

"I don't know," Dearka told him, eyes narrow, "but look at that flying style. Isn't something about it... familiar?"

Yzak turned to look at him sharply, but then paused, an arrested expression on his face. "Wait a second..." Though he kept most of his attention on his own survival, he also took some time to carefully watch the azure interloper and its actions. There _was_ something about it...

The sniper rifle was now slung behind its right should, and its right hand had grasped the hilt of an enormous broadsword sheathed at its left hip. Screaming into the battle area at a speed no pilot should've been able to endure, it flew right past a Dagger L... and swept out the sword in the same instant, ripping it through the enemy machine like it didn't even exist.

Yzak hardly noticed the subsequent explosion. _That speed,_ he thought, mind racing, _those reflexes... that coordination between pilot and mobile suit. I've seen great pilots before, but this... Only one thing can allow a pilot to do that!_

"Dearka," he said aloud, bringing his full attention back to the battle, "keep an eye on that one. I know it's not attacking us right now, but it's making me nervous. You _know_ who has to be in that cockpit."

"Or _what,"_ Dearka agreed. "Only neural interfacing gives a pilot _that _degree of control unless he's an Ultimate Coordinator, and maybe not even then. That's a Destroyer, all right."

Yzak snorted. "Wonderful. I wonder what _this_ one is up to." He no longer believed the official story about the ABADDON program, as he was well aware of what had been done to produce the Hydra, but that only made him more wary of any other survivors. There was no telling whose side they'd be on, if any.

This one's intent, however, appeared remarkably clear; at least, the sight of the azure mobile suit tearing through Dagger Ls with a sword seemed a clear indication of friendship toward the PLANTs. Plowing through the battle area like a juggernaut, moving at a pace sufficiently faster than ordinary mobile suits that enemy targeting systems were having trouble locking on, the Destroyer saw an old, first-run GINN take a beam saber to the chest and explode, and the azure machine responded by chopping down with its sword, cutting the offending Dagger L in half from head to legs.

There was no time for Yzak and Dearka to fixate their attention on the newcomer, though. Beams and missiles were flying everywhere as mobile suits and capital ships engaged in mortal combat, explosions painfully clear in the vacuum of space as some of those mobile suits and ships blew apart, taking dozens, sometimes hundreds, of people to their graves.

"Enough of this!" Yzak snarled, opening up with his Gatlings and beam rifle simultaneously against a small group of Daggers. "How many times do they have to attack the PLANTs like this, anyway? I'm getting tired of this!" Bullets and beams perforated his targets, tearing away limbs and heads and blasting them to pieces as he unleashed his wrath.

"Don't be too fixated on them," a new voice warned, as the sniper began transmitting, using a synthesizer to distort her voice. "This isn't the real thrust of their advance."

Yzak glanced sharply at the azure machine. "Who are you, and what are you talking about? If this isn't the real attack, then what is?"

"My name is meaningless; I forfeited the right to be remembered a long time ago. Suffice to say that your old captain and I were once good friends, and comrades in arms. Now I am merely a wandering soldier, who happened to be present when this attack was launched from Arzachel." Switching the sword to its left hand, the azure machine snapped its sniper rifle back into firing position, and blasted a Dagger L at point-blank range, before continuing on at the same bone-breaking acceleration. "I saw them deploying a new model of mobile suit, along with nuclear warheads; I followed them here, so I'm quite certain they're the same ones. They've just not announced themselves yet."

_"Nukes!"_ Yzak snarled in anger. "Those _bastards!"_ He didn't question the information; if the Destroyer were working for the enemy, she wouldn't have blown away so many Daggers herself. "But where...?"

"I've got them, Yzak," Dearka broke in, listening to another transmission. "A recon GINN just spotted additional Earth Forces units, they were hiding behind an asteroid." He cursed. "They're new models, all right, and they're definitely carrying nuclear weapons."

Yzak's curse was far more venomous. "Those bastards... then the ones we've been fighting were nothing but decoys!" His hands tightened on his controls. "C'mon, Dearka, let's get those nukes before they can reach the PLANTs!"

"Roger that."

"I'm going with you," the sniper informed them. "Those Earth Forces units are heading for Aprilius; I was born on Aprilius Nine. I'm not letting history repeat."

Yzak gazed at the azure machine through narrowed eyes. "How do I know I can trust you?" he said carefully.

"Because Nicol Amalfi was my cousin."

Both ZAFT pilots jerked in surprise, scarcely noticing as a _Nazca_ blew apart only a kilometer away, for they knew that name well. Once their teammate, he had died at the hands of the man who would become one of their most trusted allies, and a good friend... and so far as either of them knew, Nicol's only surviving relatives were his parents.

The old, familiar pain in the sniper's voice told the tale, however. Whoever she was, she had indeed known their long-dead friend... and that was all they needed to know.

"Right," Yzak said at last. "Let's get going, then. And... I'm sorry."

"Not your fault, Commander Joule," the sniper told him, smiling a little behind her flight helmet. "I know how my cousin died; and I don't blame Hydra for it, either. What's done is done. Fortunes of war; what matters now is making sure all that he -and my commander- fought for is not all in vain."

* * *

Flay breathed a heartfelt sigh of relief as the flames outside her cockpit finally died down. She'd remembered what had happened to Kira during _his_ first atmospheric reentry all too well -and from what she'd heard, even Kevin had been knocked unconscious by it, despite his augmentation- and had worried something similar would happen to her. Fortunately, however, either ZAFT was getting better at that sort of thing -possible, considering ZGMF-X10A Freedom's arrival at Alaska- or Carter had been doing some tinkering. Either way, reentry had gone remarkably smoothly.

Now she had only one problem: according to her navigation systems, she was at least two thousand kilometers away from Orb, over the Republic of East Asia... and she was running low on power. _I've got just enough to find someplace to land,_ she thought, checking her power reserves nervously, _and only if I hurry..._

As near as Flay could tell, she was currently over Tibet; that at least meant there were probably places in the mountains where she could hide out. The only problems with that were locating a landing site that _wouldn't_ smash her to bits -she'd already had to deactivate the PSA to save power- and that even if she _did_ land successfully, she'd be trapped behind what were, for all intents and purposes, enemy lines. Even if the war hadn't begun again, there was the small matter that Carter had almost certainly been correct when he warned her of what would happen if the Earth Forces were to find her.

"Worry about that later," she muttered to herself, bringing the Impulse unit around in a gentle turn toward the nearest mountaintop. "The Earth Forces can't kill you if you've already killed yourself crashing into a cliff..."

Squinting into the darkness on her display, Flay thought she saw lights on a small plateau; a small house, it looked like, with enough room near it to set down. It wasn't ideal -she'd rather not be anywhere near _anyone_- but it would do. So, taking a deep breath, she locked in her course, and prepared for her first mobile suit landing within the influence of gravity.

* * *

John Tyler was still staring toward Lagrange point Five when Natarle grabbed his arm. "Uh... John," she said carefully, "there's someone coming."

"Huh? Coming from where-?" He chopped off his own voice, and blinked in confusion at the sight of the mobile suit that was descending out of the western sky, apparently intent on landing literally in their front yard. "Who in the world...? Wait a second, Natarle, that's one of the new ZAFT models! What's one of their new prototypes doing here?"

"I don't know," she replied, equally bemused, "but I think we're about to find out." She glanced briefly at his waist. "I don't suppose you're armed?"

"A Metal Storm pistol under my shirt," John answered, gaze locked on the rapidly-descending mobile suit. "You'd better take it; you know I'm not very good with those things."

"Right." Moving with practiced ease, Natarle quickly pulled out the peculiar-looking weapon, and checked its charge. A medium-sized pistol, it was shaped like an automatic, but had no traditional magazine; or, for that matter, an ejection port, hammer, firing pin, or any other moving part besides the trigger itself. It had four barrels, each loaded with five forty-five caliber rounds in a horizontal "stack", rather than a traditional magazine-fed system. The rounds were triggered by sending an electronic signal along the barrel to the primer, setting off each bullet in sequence, rather than a standard firing pin; and because of the speed with which they were fired, three rounds would leave the barrel before the pistol even had a chance to recoil, thus ensuring they would all hit at precisely the point the shooter desired, instead of the usual dispersal.

John and Natarle had taken a small cache of the unusual weapons with them from Onishi Mansion when they set out for Tibet; as far as they knew, Kevin's stash was the only one in existence. The Metal Storm system had been developed long before, but apparently lost during the chaos of the Reconstruction War, thus depriving the world of perhaps the most revolutionary weapons system that had existed before the advent of practical directed-energy weapons. Prometheus Unchained was reviving the concept, but for now, only the Onishi family's stash of old weapons contained the deadly firearms.

It would certainly be adequate to deal with any unfriendly visitors.

As expected, the Impulse unit swept toward the very plateau on which they stood, and soon came to a bone-jarring landing on one knee. As it settled, its phase-shift armor -present in an odd crimson and black scheme- faded away, indicating that wherever it had come from, it had involved a long journey... which likely meant it had landed here simply to avoid crashing.

A few tense moments passed with nothing happening -presumably the pilot was still unstrapping- and then the hatch popped open, allowing the pilot to exit and ride the zip line down to the ground. "There's something familiar about that figure," John noted, gazing curiously at the pilot. "Female, for sure, and... Wait a second!"

Natarle blinked. "Flay Allster?" she said in surprise, lowering the pistol. "What are _you_ doing here?"

The pilot removed her helmet, and it was indeed Flay, looking fully as surprised to see them as they were to see her. "Invictus? Commander Badgiruel? W... what are _you_ doing in this place?"

John sighed. "Sounds like we've both got things to tell, eh? To answer your question first, mate, Natarle and I settled out here after the war; figured we needed a little time off in some distant corner of the world before getting hauled into the next world." He grinned sheepishly. "We got married about a year after we got here, as it happens."

Flay blinked. She'd known the two had been getting close by the time of the big celebration at Onishi Mansion at the end of the war, but _that..._ "Um... I see..."

Natarle coughed lightly. "Well, that's _our_ story," she said, carefully changing the subject. "What about _you,_ Flay? You disappeared two years ago, even more thoroughly than we did; what happened?"

"I was kidnapped," the young redhead replied, "by Jack Carter."

John's jade eyes flashed. "Carter did _what?"_ he hissed. "That bastard. The next time I see him-"

"Wait a minute, Invictus," Flay interrupted, raising a hand. "It wasn't like that. Carter told me, and I believe him, that agents of Blue Cosmos intended to assassinate me as soon as I got within their reach; kidnapping me was the only way to keep me safe, and that's what he's done for the last two years."

Natarle frowned. "But why would he do that in the first place? He's a sociopath obsessed with killing Kevin, isn't he?"

"Not... exactly," Flay said slowly. "He does intend to kill Kevin, but... he's not exactly a sociopath, either. He learned his lesson two years ago; he won't harm anyone _but_ Kevin if he can avoid it."

John grunted; he still wasn't exactly inclined to trust his fellow clone, even with Flay's observations to consider. "So how'd you escape?" he asked. "And why'd you wind up in Tibet, of all places? You look like you had a rough trip, mate."

Flay nodded. "I did. It turns out that Carter's been in contact -apparently unwilling, form everything I heard- with someone from Kevin's past; that man turned up a few days ago, while Carter was gone... and turned the clone army Carter's people were creating against him." She lightly touched the pistol holstered at her waist. "The first they were going to do was kill me, so I had to... appropriate the weapon from the first clone they sent to kill me." She smiled suddenly; it wasn't a pleasant expression. "The clone didn't survive the experience... and neither did several of his fellows."

Natarle raised an eyebrow; the girl was sounding far more mature than _Dominion_'s exec remembered, and also very casual where death-dealing was concerned. "Kevin must've rubbed off on you," she commented dryly. "So... who's behind all this? Some other survivor from the Destroyers, out for revenge? Another group of rogue ZAFT soldiers?"

Flay shook her head. "Worse," she said grimly. "His name is John Tyler Onishi."

John's eyes went wide. "My father?" he blurted, forgetting for a moment that he himself was a clone. "But he's dead! And why would he...?"

"They never found a body," Natarle reminded him. "The passengers could only be identified by the shuttle's manifest. But you're right, why would he come back after five years just to start all _this?"_

"I don't know," Flay said honestly. "He confronted me directly, but wouldn't explain everything; all I could figure out was that Kevin was apparently deliberately created for some kind of task, which he failed at... and he's infected with some kind of virus that was intended to act as a failsafe, just in case this happened."

"Snake Eater," John murmured in sudden understanding. "We haven't been in touch with Orb much lately, but we know about that; something in Kevin's DNA is causing gradual cellular apoptosis... Uh oh."

Natarle glanced at him in concern, noting the way his expression suddenly tightened. "What's wrong?"

"Just an ugly thought, mate: if that was programmed into _Kevin's_ genetic code... then I have it, too." He shivered. "Good thing the old Baron doesn't have any way of knowing about me, so he can't activate it..." He shook himself. "Enough about that. That explains something else, now that I think about it: Baron Onishi must've been the one who killed Frank."

Flay gasped. "Frank Castile is dead?"

Natarle nodded. "Murdered the same day Armory One was attacked; someone walked right into his office and shot him. That must have been the Baron himself, tying up some kind of loose end." She sighed. "Well, Flay, I'm glad to see you're okay. Why don't we head inside? You can stay here until we figure out how to get you to Orb... and how to make sure you don't get killed the minute the Earth Forces realize you're still around."

* * *

"Almost there," Yzak murmured, as his ZAKU Phantom -flanked by Dearka's ZAKU and the sniper's peculiar azure machine- neared the section of space where the Earth Forces' true attack was being launched. "Let's go, you two."

"Roger that," Dearka acknowledged, raising his beam cannon.

"Ten-roger," the enigmatic cyborg concurred. "Enemy in sight; now engaging." The azure mobile suit's sword whipped out, and energy poured into its thrusters, boosting it ahead of the two ZAFT pilots.

"Wait, you... Oh, forget it." Yzak found the sniper's impetuousness irritating, but he didn't attempt to act on it; for one thing, the Destroyer was not and had not been for years in ZAFT's chain of command. For another, he could almost hear his old captain's voice now, muttering about the pot calling the kettle black.

Still, it _was_ a reckless stunt, even for a Destroyer, considering that there was no way the woman had much in the way of combat experience in a mobile suit. She might've gotten away with participating in guerrilla warfare without anyone hearing of it, but an azure mobile suit wreaking havoc all over space _would_ have been noticed.

Which meant that what would've been a fairly standard tactic for Yzak's old boss was something decidedly less intelligent for this mysterious woman.

"She's obsessed," Dearka opined, counting on the sniper's fixation on the enemy to keep her from noticing the remark. "If she really _is_ Nicol's cousin, she's probably not thinking very clearly where the safety of the PLANTs is concerned. She's-"

"She's going to get herself killed if we don't do something," his commander interrupted. "And I don't know about you, but I think a Destroyer might be more useful alive. Besides," he added grudgingly, "I owe Captain Walker. I'm not about to let one of his friends die here."

"Good luck." The other pilot spoke sarcastically, but he, too, thought of Kevin Walker as a friend... and knew all too well what ZAFT had put the Destroyers through. So, taking careful aim with his cannon, he sent a burst of red-orange fire across space, ripping into the first mobile suit he saw and essentially reducing it to free-floating hydrogen. "She was right, Yzak, those _are_ new models; I don't recognize them. I _do_ recognize the munitions, though."

"Nukes," Yzak snarled. "They'll pay for using those..." He charged forward, firing his back-mounted Gatlings and beam rifle, using them to put up a barrage of fire... and then hesitated, hearing a transmission over the radio.

_"This is Command. Begin deployment of Neutron Stampeder immediately; the enemy will reach effective range for nuclear missiles in under three minutes."_

_"Roger that,"_ another voice replied. _"Charging Neutron Stampeder; they'll have time to get those missiles off, but we'll be ready long before the warheads enter range of the PLANTs."_

_"Understood. All ZAFT forces, stand clear, and prepare for nuclear detonation."_

"Think we'd better do that, Yzak," Dearka remarked, reversing thrust with bone-jarring force and coming to a stop relative to the PLANTs. "I think this place it about to get real hot."

"Yeah," Yzak agreed; he knew his friend wasn't talking about literal heat, but rather radiation from the numerous nuclear explosions. "Sniper, you'd better go out of there," he went on. "The situation-"

"Forget it!" the Destroyer snapped. "I'm not letting them do this, and I'm not counting on anyone else's help! Take it from me, Commander: technology fails sometimes, and someone needs to be out here to pick up the pieces if it does." Her sword ripped into a backhand slash, tearing one of the new-model mobile suits in half, and passing through a nuclear missile along the way.

Yzak shook his head in frustration. "Look, whoever you are, I know you people are tough, but even you won't survive if you're that close to a nuke, and you don't have the experience for this kind of thing. Get out of there!"

"No! My cousin died for the sake of the PLANTs, and I-" As she spoke, the sniper was simultaneously cutting one Earth Forces machine in half and blasting another with her powerful sniper rifle, but at the same time, a third came up from behind and triggered a shot directly into the azure mobile suit's back.

"Watch it!" Cursing, Dearka fired his cannon without waiting for orders, sending a red-orange beam smashing through the enemy's torso, but it was too late. "Blast it... Are you okay? Hey, answer me!"

"Too late," Yzak said grimly, motioning toward a nearby _Nazca_-class destroyer. It looked peculiar, with some kind of apparatus mounted over most of its hull. "That thing's about to-"

_"Firing Neutron Stampeder,"_ the radio said, just as missiles began to fly from the Earth Forces ships and mobile suits.

The barrage of neutrons spread across space, acting as the exact opposite of a Neutron-jammer. Rather than halting the nuclear reactions within weapons and reactors, it vastly accelerated them, allowing what should've been non-critical masses -prior to deliberate activation, at any rate- to erupt into super-critical detonations.

Neither Yzak nor Dearka saw the results; their displays all polarized as light erupted across space, the missiles that had just been launched against the PLANTs instead exploding just beyond the launchers that fired them... engulfing an entire Earth Forces fleet in nuclear fire, the likes of which hadn't been seen since X10A Freedom and X09A Justice defeated the last nuclear attack on the PLANTs, two years before.

The Earth Forces literally had no idea what had happened. They'd never even realized something like the Neutron Stampeder might even be possible, let alone that ZAFT might've built it. As a consequence of that fatal oversight, what should've been an overwhelming victory became a terrible defeat as explosion after brilliant explosion shattered the clear void, destroying the Earth Fores assault force as completely as anything short of an antimatter explosion could.

By the time that terrible light finally faded, the enemy was gone... and there was no sign of the azure mobile suit.

* * *

In his office, Gilbert Durandal sighed. "We've won this round," he murmured. "The Earth Forces attack has been stopped dead..."

"But the Neutron Stampeder only has one shot," the Ukrainian-accented voice behind him pointed out quietly. "If they attack again before it can recharge..."

"They won't do that," he asserted, turning. "And I think you know that, Delta. That's _your_ area of expertise, after all." He glanced at the desktop display which had, moments earlier, shown the short but fierce battle outside the PLANTs. "What's your analysis of what just happened?"

"The Alliance got cocky," Arkanian said simply, "and paid for it with hundreds of lives; typical of them to put so many people in harm's way just to wipe us out. This is one of those days I'm particularly glad I emigrated. Ukraine wouldn't be a healthy environment for me right now." She tapped her chin in thought. "The battle went much as I expected, frankly... except for one thing."

"The azure mobile suit." Durandal nodded. "I wondered about that myself. Something Hydra dispatched? It's clear by now that he's been carefully researching new weapons over the last couple of years; or at the least, kept old ones in reserve. I think it likely he's the one responsible for the continued existence of the Justice, even if Jack Carter did end up stealing it."

"I have no doubt you're right about my old student being up to something, Chairman... but I assure you, he wasn't responsible for this one." Arkanian smiled slightly. "Even I haven't been able to dig up many of his secrets, but I can tell you this much: Kevin does _not_ have the direct support of any of his former comrades, even assuming any of them survived. If he did, he wouldn't have batted an eye when I warned him about Case Ragnarok; as it was, the basilisk look he gave me tells me he's concerned, and he wouldn't be if he had others he could count on."

"So you think that was a Destroyer," he murmured. "But how can you be sure it wasn't his clone, Invictus?"

"Because Invictus isn't a pilot." The ABADDON instructor tapped her chin again, calling up the relevant files in her cortical implant. "He's qualified on armed shuttles -that's how he got around when Le Creuset still employed him- but there's no indication that he ever flew mobile suits. What records we do have of the Four Ships Alliance indicate that, after leaving Le Creuset's employ, he worked first as a confidential agent for the Clynes, then a covert ops planner on the _Kusanagi,_ and finally as _Dominion_'s fire-control officer. As far as I've been able to determine, he has no combat piloting ability at all; nor, for that matter, is he sniper-qualified, which that pilot clearly was. Invictus is apparently known for being mediocre with firearms, compared to the original. Good by normal Coordinator standards, but not up to Destroyer standard by any means."

"Then who?"

Arkanian shrugged. "Hard to say; I don't have enough of a sample to determine whose flying style that was, and it doesn't look like I'm ever going to get the chance, judging from the machine's position when the warheads detonated. From what I overheard of Joule's and Elsman's conversation, though, there aren't many possible suspects."

"It _was_ a female voice," Durandal noted thoughtfully.

"Indeed. And only four members of the team were female: Tanya 'Harpy' Coleson, Tessa 'Gorgon' Dortmund, Erica 'Scylla' Hawke, and of course Rachel 'Medusa' Carver. Of those, I think we can safely assume Hawke is dead; her sisters have certainly been acting as though Kevin confirmed it. Rachel Carver is also confirmed KIA. I have it from multiple sources that Hydra still has nightmares about that particular incident. That leaves Dortmund and Coleson."

"She also claimed to be a cousin of Nicol Amalfi," he pointed out. "Shouldn't your records...?"

Arkanian shook her head. "I have the same records you do, Tovarisch Chairman. The only Destroyer with known family was Hawke, though I've long suspected Carver and King were actually half-siblings. In any case, no such relation is mentioned, possibly due to family influence altering the woman's records; though why they would, I have no idea. And since Yuri Amalfi probably wouldn't take kindly to either of us turning up at his home and asking if his dead son had any cousins we should know about..."

"Agreed." Durandal shrugged. "I suppose it doesn't really matter anyway; no one could've survived that explosion."

"Don't be too sure of that," Delta warned him. "Hydra's entire body was destroyed once, remember, and he returned. Still, in this case you're likely correct; if I'm right, and Hydra really _does_ have some kind of experimental system built into him, I doubt any of the others would have it. He was always on the cutting edge as far as augmentation was concerned." She shook her head. "No, I think this is simply going to be one more of life's unanswerable mysteries, Chairman, and not one we need worry about." She nodded at the display. "All _we_ need to concern ourselves with is the aftermath of this attack. Whatever happens now, I doubt it will be pretty."

* * *

Athrun wasn't surprised by the delay in speaking with Durandal; under the circumstances, it would've been more surprising had there _not_ been one. He didn't know precisely what had happened in the battle, but the fact that he was still alive -rather than a collection of radioactive atoms- indicated that ZAFT had somehow won, and with almost absurd ease.

While waiting for Durandal to turn up, he took care of other matters, and started to wander into a restroom. _Still have a little time before the meeting,_ he reasoned, _and..._

Athrun's thoughts were interrupted by the appearance of a startling-familiar face. The dress wasn't exactly the style he was used to her wearing, but that face... "Lacus?" he blurted. "What are _you_ doing here?" Last he knew, she was on Earth, with Kira, so what...?

The young woman didn't appear surprised at being identified by that name; instead, she smiled broadly at him. "Athrun! It's good to see you! You're here to speak with the Chairman, right?"

_Huh? What's going _on_ here? Lacus knows... Wait, this isn't..._ "That's right," Athrun managed. "But what are _you _doing here? I mean..."

"I won't keep you from your meeting," the woman said cheerfully, instead of answering. "See you later, Athrun!" She left then, with an energy that Athrun found at odds with her resemblance to Lacus Clyne.

Now completely confused, Athrun stepped out again, wondering just what in the world was going on. Before he had time to ponder the matter, though, Durandal himself walked by, then paused. "That's right," the Chairman said, almost to himself. "I have an appointment with you, don't I? A pleasure to see you again, Alex." He held out his hand.

"Likewise," Athrun said uncertainly, shaking the proffered hand.

Durandal looked at him closely. "Is something wrong?"

Athrun shook his head. "No, it's nothing." _Nothing... yet. But I have to wonder: who was that girl, and why did she look like Lacus? I think that's something Kevin's going to be interested in learning, too...  
_

* * *

Hundreds of thousands of kilometers below the PLANTs, and a young man with sandy hair directed his jade gaze at the sky from the roof of his mansion, watching the nuclear fire that blossomed amidst the starry night. "It begins..." he whispered. "Just like she said..."

"The second war?" Leona Colde asked, coming up behind him. "Or your own decision?"

"One goes hand in hand with the other," Kevin replied, not bothering to turn his head. "...One of my old teammates was up there, and she made _her_ choice; now it's time for me to make mine... before Delta makes it for me."

"And the Chief Representative?"

He sighed. "She's been getting steadily more distant lately, tovarisch; I think the Seirans are up to something, and my own... difficulties haven't been helping. Still, the only way to keep her safe may be to go back to my old life... to take up arms once again."

Leona nodded slowly. "So what happens now, mon ami?"

"Now?" Above them, the last splotches of brilliant light began to fade, yet the two watchers both knew it was only the beginning. "Now we wait... and ride the whirlwind of the new conflict." Kevin fingered the scar from the day, long before, when half his face had been blown off in one of the many battles in his early teens. "One of my comrades just made her choice; now it's my turn."

"Everything begins now," she noted.

"Yes..."

And the fiery lights of this night sky would surely not be the last... not if the sleeping tiger awoke once more.

* * *

Author's note: The new war has begun with the fury of nuclear fire; even as both sides prepare for the battles ahead, other plots begin to emerge. The fate of two Destroyers remains uncertain, while one man plots in the shadows to complete the task for which Project Guardian was truly conceived...

My apologies for the lateness of this chapter; I'm afraid things happened last week that resulted in an unavoidable delay. Now, however, I'm back on my stride, and the next chapter should be about rather faster. In the meantime, I hope this one was at least interesting. -Solid Shark


	10. Chapter 10: Fateful Decisions

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_She was so exhausted from the battle of Panama, both physically and mentally but Leona would find no rest. As soon as she had returned to space, the tired soldier had received an order for a personal meeting with Patrick Zala and what had transpired in their clandestine meet had led her to this: shadowing his son, as Athrun Zala looked around the ruined mansion of Siegel Clyne for any clues to the location of his outlaw fiancée, and waiting to finish her mission._

_To kill Lacus Clyne…_

_Leona had carefully followed Athrun Zala as he wandered around Clyne residence, which looked like a battlefield. Keeping a discreet distance, she saw him stop near some bushes and was surprised when a small, pink robot came out to greet the young man ...she couldn't move in closer to hear what the small robot said to him, but Athrun seemed pensive for a moment. Then she noticed a spark of remembrance come into his eyes, and he suddenly bolted to his car. Leona hid herself until she was sure he was gone, then followed after him, with the tracer she had placed in his car, on her motorcycle..._

_It was quite a few hours worth of driving, until Leona saw him pull up at an old abandoned theater._

The White Symphony_, Leona thought to herself, remembering the place where Lacus had first sung and her own first time going to a concert of all things after a successful mission._

_She was sure that Patrick Zala had also sent some extra assassins to insure that Lacus Clyne would die, but the female assassin just shook her head in resignation at the little faith the chairman had in the NGSF._

_Leona looked around for a few moments to find a good spot to set-up, and saw an adjacent building that had a perfect view inside of the theater through a broken window. She grabbed a bulging black duffel bag stowed on her cycle and went on her way._

_It took her less than a minute to get to her spot and set-up her custom PSG-1; then she carefully calibrated her scope and peered inside. When she saw what was transpiring within the abandoned theater, she raised her eyebrow._

_Athrun Zala, former fiance of Lacus Clyne, had a gun pointed at the pink princess while shouting something at Lacus. Lacus, on the other hand, looked serene and like she wasn't bothered that Athrun had a gun pointed at her. Leona saw her say something to him and the Zala boy recoiled in disbelief at whatever she said. _

_Spotting two black vans pulling up in front of the abandoned theater, Leona momentarily shifted her scope from the two to the van where several men in black suits emerged, carrying automatic weapons. Leona's hunch was confirmed: Chairman Zala had indeed sent more assassins... but Leona wrote them of as cannon fodder as she refocused on the girl._

Cannon fodder they may be, but they work perfectly as a diversion_, Leona thought to herself as the would-be assassins confronted the two, then opened fire, prompting both Lacus and Athrun to seek shelter behind a broken wall._

_But it was useless against Leona; her position was elevated and she could still focus on Lacus -who was within her crosshairs- and she slowed her breath in preparation to fire._

"_Forgive me," Leona said. She exhaled slowly, and was about to pull the trigger when she just stopped and realized what she was doing. This wasn't her. She had already avenged her dead parents and her fallen brethren; her own personal agenda was done. Leona had no other reason to get more involved in the war. ZAFT was a means to an end, nothing more…_

_Leaning against an adjacent wall as she sat down, the assassin was silent, lost in her thoughts "My personal chaos..." Leona said out loud after being silent for a moment, "...is already finished. My loyalty will be to my fallen family…"_

_She took the scope from the sniper rifle, using it to look into the theater to learn the outcome of the fight._

_She saw that Patrick's other assassins were dead, while both Lacus and Athrun were joined by an armored figure with what looked like a katana strapped to its back, and by a redhead whom Leona recognized as the Desert Tiger's second in command._

_"Hmmm...I guess the dead don't stay dead..." mused Leona. She put everything back in her duffel bag, and went down the stairwell leading to the building's exit, taking extra caution not to be noticed by anyone. _

_Exiting the building quickly and silently, she felt around momentarily with her limited empathy to see if anyone had detected her. Sensing no one, she walked quickly to where her cycle was parked, hidden in the shadows of a back alley. _

_"Mission failed," uttered Leona as she turned on the ignition, drove away from her mission, and vanished into the night.  
_

* * *

"It's begun..." Kira Yamato whispered, staring up at the night sky. Still fading were the afterimages of the tremendous explosions that had erupted across space, and he knew exactly what they were, having fought similar weapons years before. "The new war..."

"Yes," Lacus Clyne agreed somberly. "It seems diplomacy has failed; I suppose Kevin would say this was inevitable." She sighed. "He might even be right. We tried so hard, two years ago, yet the cycle begins again, the same as before."

The two of them stood on the cliff beyond Onishi Mansion, overlooking the sea; as ever, the place was peaceful, belying the terrible light that had lit up the sky mere moments before. A calm at the center of many storms, it had come through the Battle of Orb unscathed, and would likely survive even the coming conflict... which made it a place of refuge for those whom the war _had_ touched.

"It makes me think of two years ago," Kira whispered. "It makes me think of Patrick Zala, and Muruta Azrael, and... Rau Le Creuset. The same feelings he exploited still exist..."

There was the sound of a soft impact behind them, as Kevin casually dropped off the mansion's roof to join them. "It's _not_ the same, Kira," he said quietly. "That nihilistic vnyebrachnyi is dead, and his legacy with him; this, for all that it's horrible, is the fury of men who wish to conquer the world, not destroy it. In some ways, better greed than vengefulness against the world."

Lacus turned to look at her brother. "That's a lesson _you_ could, perhaps, stand to learn, Kevin," she said pointedly.

The ex-super-soldier was unfazed. "Rau Le Creuset was indiscriminate," he pointed out calmly. "His anger had no specific target. I, on the other hand, only harm those who have harmed _me."_ His softly glowing eyes narrowed. "You know, as well as I, that my father will try to take advantage of the situation. And unless those of us who know of his continued survival act, he will very likely succeed. He may be more dangerous than Le Creuset was."

Kira frowned. "But you just said 'better greed than vengefulness against the world'..."

"Yes, but there's a bit of a difference between my father and the Blue Cosmos monsters who just got blasted to bits." Kevin motioned toward the huge edifice behind them. "The Earth Forces tend to use brute force to attain their goals, not subtlety, and so they're often clumsy with their hammers. My father, on the other hand, is more a fan of the assassin's knife than the headsman's axe. He's been planning for twenty years now; he knows how to be patient to obtain what he wants." He smiled coldly. "But he's made one miscalculation: by taking advantage of this war, he'll expose himself eventually... and I'll be waiting."

"With what?" Lacus asked, almost afraid of the answer.

"The same thing with which he'd greet me," her brother said simply. "I'll treat him as he would treat me. It's only fair."

Kira shivered, very glad that the young Baron's wrath would almost certainly never be directed at him. _He's diabolical,_ he thought, not for the first time. _The nicest guy you could ever meet... unless he decides you have to die. Still..._

"Still," he said aloud, "you know that your father isn't the only issue right now." He nodded at the sky above them, so recently a battlefield. "If you involve yourself in stopping your father's plot, you involve yourself in what's going on up there. Are you really ready to do that, Kevin?"

"I don't know," the youth said softly, turning away. "I've thought about it... and I don't know. Cagalli won't want me to... but my past may leave me no choice." Clearly troubled, he turned, and walked back toward the mansion.

Lacus watched him go, concerned for her brother. _His true self is beginning to return,_ she thought to herself._What does Fate hold in store for a fierce tiger emerging from a long slumber with wounds still unhealed?  
_

* * *

_"Mere hours ago, the PLANTs were rocked by the unexpected news that the Earth Alliance had, once again, declared war against the colonies, rendering the Junius Treaty of C.E. 72 null and void. Following this shocking announcement was the even more shocking actions of the Earth Alliance, as they launched a surprise nuclear attack against the PLANTs, opening the war in the same manner the attempted to the first with. Fortunately, ZAFT was able to stop the attack at the last minute, by means of a newly-developed countermeasure, which remains classified at this time."_

In Chairman Gilbert Durandal's office, Athrun Zala watched the PLANT news broadcast in disbelief. "I can't believe they actually did it," he murmured.

"I was surprised as well," Durandal admitted. "Not only by the attack itself -which came with little warning at all- but also by the fact that they used nuclear weapons. After what happened two years ago..." He shook his head. "Thanks to that attack, we're now in a position very similar to the one we occupied at the beginning of the last war."

Athrun nodded slowly. "So... what are you going to do, Sir? About all this?"

"If we respond with military force," the Chairman began, "and authorize offensive operations, we'll be plunged into another full-scale war, on the order of the first Earth/ZAFT War. However," he said heavily, "it's not exactly possible to conceal a full-scale nuclear attack from the public, as that broadcast proves."

Athrun closed hie eyes. _This is too much like two years ago,_ he thought. _If we take the wrong path, this could be just as bad..._

"Please, Chairman," he began aloud, "don't let ZAFT's response be dictated by all the hatred that the PLANTs are feeling over this attack. That would just spread the same madness my father created, during the last war..." He clenched a fist. "My name is Athrun Zala," he said softly, "and I believed my father's words. Because of that, I killed many people. I even came close to killing my best friends-"

"I heard from Shinn Asuka what the terrorists at Junius Seven said," Durandal interrupted with a nod. "I understand what that must have done to you, hearing those words. But tell me... was Patrick Zala always evil?"

Athrun shook his head. "No," he said quietly. "Not always. I... I think it was the Bloody Valentine that made him snap... when my mother died..."

Durandal nodded again. "That's what I though. Understand something, Athrun: however evil your father might have been, whatever deeds he may have committed, he did it all for the safety of the PLANTs. Even the projects that we now know to have been misguided at best -ABADDON, Serpent Head, the Next-Generation Special Forces- all of them were aimed at the defense of the PLANTs." He nodded at the display that had recently shown the news broadcast. "Unfortunately, people tend to hear only what they wish to hear; a trait I fear your friend the Baron also shares, to a certain extent. At any rate, because of this, the terrorists were able to twist your father's words, use them in their anger against the Naturals."

"I don't think Kevin would put it quite that way..."

"Perhaps not," the Chairman acknowledged. "I rather doubt, however, that he pays much attention to the matter anymore; as you both said, the Baron personally executed your father for his actions... actions which _you,_ Athrun, cannot be held accountable for. Nor should you bear the burden of responsibility for the actions of those influenced by your father's actions or words."

_Sounds like things Kevin and Kira have tried to tell me often enough,_ Athrun thought to himself. _For that matter, we always tried to tell Kevin the same thing, back when he was blaming himself for the whole ABADDON affair. Now..._

"The fact that you're here shows that even you know that, deep down," Durandal pointed out. "And I'm glad you _are_ here; that you're so dedicated to the preservation of peace that you came all the way to the PLANTs to discuss it." He smiled. "For that, I'm grateful."

"So what now, Chairman? How can this situation possibly be resolved without..."

"Without our response being dictated by hatred?" Durandal nodded at the display which had shown the news broadcast. "Just watch," he said, as the screen came to life again.

The face on it was the same one Athrun had seen before this very meeting... the face of the Lacus who was not Lacus.

Down on Earth, Athrun was quite sure his lethal friend was about to have a fit.

* * *

Kevin was in his Morgenroete office, taking care of a few clandestine details regarding the repairs of one of his personal warships (a matter which had become more urgent with recent events; hence his rapid arrival after witnessing the nuclear attack), when Erica Simmons poked her head in. "A broadcast in the PLANTs I think you'll want to see, My Lord," she announced, and then left again.

_A broadcast from the PLANTs...? What's going on now?_ He activated his desk terminal, hoping it didn't involve yet another attempt to blast the PLANTs to atoms.

Fortunately, he was wrong. _Un_fortunately, the truth was even worse.

"What the _blazes?"_ he demanded, seeing what appeared to be Lacus' face -which was impossible; barring certain technology Oracle had been toying with, without much success, she could never have reached the PLANTs in so short a time- appear on his monitor. The dress was unfamiliar, and the figure seemed slightly... exaggerated, but the face was both unmistakable and impossible.

Even the voice was the same. _"Good evening to all in the PLANTs,"_ she began, sounding exactly like the young woman she looked like. _"I wish this speech came following a more auspicious occasion, but sadly this is not the case. We have been witness to tragic events, in the form of the fall of Junius Seven and the nuclear attack the Earth Forces have launched against us. However, tragic though these events may be, we dare not respond in anger, for that would only bring about another war, perhaps more devastating than the last."_

Kevin stared in disbelief. Not only was she clearly an impostor -an affront in itself- but she was also perhaps the most naive person he'd ever seen. _If? _If?_ This _is_ a war, you idiot! You don't think you can stop it now, do you? The Earth Alliance isn't about to back down even after a failure as spectacular as this._

The impostor was continuing, and now she had Kevin's full attention. _"Everyone,"_ she said, _"please, calm down. Trust in the efforts made by Chairman Durandal and the Supreme Council to resolve this situation peacefully, and do not allow your anger to blind you to the truth. Vengeance is not the answer; war is not the answer. What we need is peace..."_

She then began to sing, and the song, too, was something Kevin recognized. It wasn't precisely the same as the version he was familiar with, but it was still recognizable... and that just made the sudden anger in his heart burn colder. _Who does she think she is, impersonating my _sister_ this way..._

He brought up a second display on his desk, using a device that he knew was completely secure. "You hear what's going on?" he demanded without preamble.

_"Yes,"_ Murrue replied. _"We're watching, too; though I must say Lacus seems remarkably calm about this."_ She tilted her head. _"Which is more than I can say for you right now, Brother. You don't look very happy."_

"I'm not," Kevin stated bluntly. "In fact, I'm furious, and I intend to have Tolle look into whatever is going on up there. In the meantime... can you slip down to the hangar without Kira noticing?"

_"Probably,"_ she said after a moment. _"...Why?"_

"Because I need you to begin startup sequence on Nemesis' primary reactor. You can't cold-start the thing, so we need to start the process now if it's to be ready at a moment's notice."

_"Kevin,"_ Murrue warned, _"you know the dangers of that thing..."_

"I know," Kevin acknowledged. "But you have to take risks sometime, and I don't trust the Seirans not to take advantage of this situation somehow. I may need Nemesis far sooner than we'd counted on."

_"And _Amaterasu?" There was a slight shiver in her tone, and he didn't blame her, given the circumstances of his acquisition of the ship.

"She's nothing but a ghost ship now," Kevin said quietly. "Leave her be, for now. Besides, repairs still haven't been completed."

_"Got it. I hope you know what you're doing, Kevin."_

"Yeah. So do I."

* * *

"It is unfortunate," Durandal said, leading Athrun down toward a restricted military area -they'd left his office at the conclusion of the broadcast- "that I have to resort to such measures, but I'm afraid Lacus Clyne has far greater influence than I do. After all, she's known and loved by all in the PLANTs, while I'm a relative newcomer to public appearance."

Athrun nodded slowly. He wasn't entirely certain he approved of the affair -he'd once been engaged to Lacus, and still considered her a close friend- but it seemed to make logical sense. "I can understand that," he said slowly, "but you may have one problem with that. I don't think Kevin will be very pleased to hear about this."

The Chairman shrugged. "Yes, I've heard that they have some familial relation, though I've never been able to determine exactly what. However, it's my opinion, and that of an advisor of mine who happens to know the Baron well, that he won't do anything overt, at least not now. Diplomatic action isn't exactly something he likes to attempt."

"True," Athrun agreed. "And his idea of _direct_ action is something not even he would try under these circumstances."

Durandal smiled wryly. "Yes, Commander Arkanian mentioned that. No, I doubt Baron Onishi would attempt lethal force at this point, even were it not for the effect on public opinion of Orb. He's not an unreasonable man; he may not approve, but he won't interfere."

_That's true... but probably not for the reasons you're thinking, Chairman. I know him too well._

They came to a hatch, then, guarded by a pair of ZAFT greencoats, who quickly saluted, then opened the hatch; had Athrun but known it, the procedure was very similar to the one his friend Kira Yamato had gone through on his way to obtaining ZGMF-X10A Freedom.

There was another similarity to that day, and Athrun's eyes widened at the sight that greeted him on the other side of the hatch. A mobile suit, its color the distinctive gray of a phase-shift-equipped machine with its armor deactivated... and a distinct resemblance to the fallen GAT-X303 Aegis and stolen ZGMF-X09A Justice. The head was nearly identical...

_But why did he bring me here?_

"This is ZGMF-X23S Savior," Durandal announced. "Fifth of the Second-Stage Series, which succeeded the original Millennium Series units, the ZAKUs. Construction began at the same time as the other four, but, as Impulse was completed ahead of schedule, Savior's construction fell behind, and so it escaped capture during the attack on Armory One. Though its strengths are somewhat different from the others, it _is_ of the same series."

Athrun moved his gaze from the motionless machine to the Chairman's face. "Why are you showing me this?"

Durandal did not answer directly. Instead, he said, "What would you say if I were to tell you I was giving this mobile suit to you?"

The ex-ZAFT pilot twitched. "I'd ask," he said after a moment of frozen surprise, "if that meant you wanted me to rejoin ZAFT."

The Chairman shook his head. "I meant exactly what I said, Athrun. I would give this to you with no strings attached." He waved a hand at the machine. "People with similar visions of peace should work together, after all. And you cannot go against the world all by yourself, Athrun, unless you have power." His gaze fixed on Athrun's again. "I want you, Athrun, to be in a position of power... to be able to correct the world if it strays off its proper path."

"It sounds like there are various people already intending to do just that," Athrun pointed out carefully, recalling Hyperion, Alec King, and the mysterious sniper from both Junius Seven and the attack on Aprilius One.

"True," Durandal conceded. "However, It's my belief -and that of Commander Arkanian, who knows them even better- that their ultimate intentions coincide with your friend Baron Onishi, and I'm afraid I know too much about his past dealings to believe he has much genuine interest in maintaining world order, or stopping entire wars."

"...You're probably right," Athrun admitted. _Kevin's said it himself often enough: he just doesn't care much about the world at large. Only about his friends... and Cagalli. He fights to protect, but he doesn't really care if protecting those close to him causes problems for the world..._

"You need to find answers, Athrun," Durandal went on persuasively. "You need to know what it is you want to do, and what it is you're _capable_ of doing... and how to _become_ capable of doing the things you want to do. To influence the world, you must have power..."

The younger man closed his eyes in thought. _What _is_ it I want to do?_ he wondered. _I came here for a reason, didn't I? Because I don't want to see the world dragged into another war like the one the Bloody Valentine started three years ago..._ "Chairman, I..."

"You don't have to decide immediately," Durandal said, understanding. "In fact, I don't want you to. You need time to think about this. Once you've done that, then make your decision, and come see me again."

Athrun nodded. "Thank you, Sir. I'll do that."

Turning away, he nodded to himself. _It won't be an easy decision, and I know that if I choose to accept the offer, Kevin won't be happy. But I can't base my decision solely on his opnion... especially since I know all too well how _he_ operates. In my place, _he_ would care only about Cagalli's opnion, in the final analysis; he's not exactly in any position to judge me. And maybe he'd even understand...  
_

* * *

Awakening was a painful experience, more painful than she'd had since that terrible day, five years ago... perhaps that was why it reminded her so much of it.

_I know that kind of ceiling,_ she thought muzzily. _It's just like Medical Section... and every other hospital I've ever known. But if I'm in a hospital... that means...!_ Suddenly the young woman's thoughts were clear, and her eyes snapped open. _The doctors would find-!_

"Relax, soldier," the voice of an older woman said gently. "You're among friends."

The super-soldier's cortical implant processed the auditory input, matched it with a known voiceprint, and delivered the information to her conscious mind. "...Representative Joule?" she whispered, cautiously sitting up and taking in her surroundings. "...What's going on?"

Ezalia Joule chuckled softly. "_Ex_-Representative now," she corrected, "but thank you. There's someone else here you should be familiar with, as well."

The young woman turned to the second person in the room, and her eyes widened. "Uncle Yuri?" she said in surprise. "I... I haven't seen you since..."

Yuri Amalfi nodded. "I know, Tessa; and I don't blame you for going underground. I heard the story from your last commander... and while I don't blame him at all, under the circumstances, I have to admit it made my wife and I both thought you really were dead."

"I almost was," Tessa Dortmund, codename Gorgon, admitted, mentally cataloguing her condition. "Just barely got out of the base before Kevin blew it up... then took the next few years to get set up for independent action." She glanced away. "I'm sorry... but I just couldn't let anyone know I was still alive. It was too dangerous."

"We know," Joule told her. "I happen to know Kevin Onishi fairly well these days, and after hearing _his_ tale, I understand why the other survivors also went underground." She cocked her head. "So, how are you feeling?"

Tessa hesitated, waiting for her systems to finish the self-diagnostic of her body. "...Like I'm suffering from a bad case of radiation poisoning, a perforated liver, and a few lacerations. So... why aren't I dead?"

"If you weren't a Destroyer," Amalfi replied quietly, "I think you would be. Your mobile suit was effectively annihilated by the nuclear explosions, and your flightsuit was ruptured; by the time our colleague Tad found your beacon, it was amazing you were alive at all."

"As near as we can determine," Joule continued, "your flightsuit repaired itself somehow, and kept you breathing long enough for you to be found."

Tessa shrugged painfully, managing a chuckle. "Well, it was kind of supposed to. I made that suit myself, with Destroyer nanotechnology; after all, not even one of us can survive without breathing for very long. We don't need as _much_ air, but we do need some..."

"'We?' You make it sound like there are still other Destroyers around," Amalfi noted. "I know about Baron Onishi, of course, but he's retired..."

She stiffened. _Oops... shouldn't have talked like that, Gorgon. He may be your uncle, but you have to maintain security, because the greater the number of people who know a secret, the greater the chance it won't _be_ a secret any longer..._

"It's all right, Miss Dortmund," Joule said reassuringly. "If you think it best not to explain, we certainly won't question your judgment; if there's one thing we've learned from our experiences with your old boss, it's that you people usually do know what you're about." She tilted her head. "The reason we ask... Well, actually, I suppose I should first ask you if you feel up to a discussion at all. This _can_ wait, if you're not feeling up to it."

Tessa looked at her curiously. "What kind of 'discussion', Ma'am? And yes, I'm feeling up to it; at least, as close to it as I'll feel for a while. My augmentation's handling the pain just fine."

"We have a proposition for you, actually," Amalfi told her, relieved that his niece wasn't about to just die on him, so soon after he'd learned that she was alive in the first place. "We... have reason to believe that Chairman Durandal will soon be sending a new message to the PLANTs, and perhaps Earth, as well. The method he intends to use is... dubious, in our opinion, and we're not at all sure we approve of the direction he's taking with his policies in the first place. What we're looking for -and we'd started looking before you ever turned up- is a counter, in case the situation is as bad as we fear."

"Situation?" the super-soldier questioned.

"Chairman Durandal has recruited Lacus Clyne to help him spread his message," Joule said bluntly. "A message we fear to be propaganda, rather than straight facts, and _that_ is a strategy we've only used once before: when Patrick Zala led us in the last war. I was in favor of it then, yes, but I've since learned my lesson."

Tessa shook her head. "I don't question your conclusions, Ma'am, but your facts aren't entirely correct. It's impossible that Durandal might have the real Lacus Clyne with him."

Amalfi frowned. "The 'real' Lacus? As opposed to what? And how do you know it can't be her?"

She sighed. "Okay, Uncle Yuri. Cards on the table time. As far as I know, there are three other survivors: Kevin, Alec King, and someone who calls himself Hyperion. I'm pretty sure there's at least one more -it's hard for a Destroyer to do _anything_ with the old systems without others being aware of it- but I know for sure about them... and I have limited contact with both Alec and Hyperion. Hyperion passed on an interesting datum the last time he contacted me: Lacus Clyne is, and has been for the past two years, living in Kevin's mansion in Orb. She is, in fact, his _sister..._ and there's no way he'd allow her to be used by Durandal. Not the way he still distrusts ZAFT."

Her uncle blinked. "Lacus Clyne has a brother?" he said, startled. "The Baron is her _brother?_ But... his father was a baron of Orb, and hers was..."

"I don't know the full details," Tessa admitted, "and for that matter I suspect few outside the confines of Onishi Mansion do know them. What I do know is that, while it isn't common knowledge, Siegel Clyne and John Tyler Onishi were brothers-in-law -Onishi's wife was Clyne's sister- so Kevin and Lacus grew up knowing each other as cousins... and it seems that in recent years evidence has come to light suggesting that Kevin is not, in fact, the previous Baron's biological son. Something to do with Baron Onishi's genetic experiments, apparently, that Clyne knew nothing of."

Joule nodded slowly. "Another well-kept secret of his... prudent, under the circumstances. His name is treated with deference and respect in Orb, but in a number of other places, it's better not to be associated with him, given his... reputation. Well, in that case, I suppose we _can_ rule out this being the genuine Lacus Clyne. But if not her... then who?"

"There are any number of ways to create an imposter, Ma'am," Tessa pointed out. "Fairly basic cosmetic surgery could do it; and we Destroyers can use our nanomachines to alter our appearances considerably. We can't exactly change gender, but combining nanotechnology with carefully arranged clothing, we can at least appear androgynous enough to cast doubt on the matter." She shrugged. "It doesn't really matter _how,_ though, does it?"

"No," Amalfi agreed. "But that's why we need you, Tessa. We need a counteragent, and you would fit the role very well. Your skills are far beyond those of normal soldiers -though if you don't mind my saying, I think you could use a few points on mobile suit tactics- and, if it ever became necessary to go public, your story is one that would be listened to very carefully."

"It could also harm the PLANTs," she warned. "That's one reason we tend to remain in the shadows; we don't want what was done with us to damage the image of the PLANTs in general. Still, you've got a point... but I have to warn both of you about one thing."

"What's that?" Joule asked, though she suspected she already knew.

"My ultimate loyalty is to Kevin, and Kevin alone," Tessa said firmly. "I'll help you out, but if he ever calls for us to join him, I _will_ obey the call."

Amalfi nodded, with a strange little smile. "That's about what I expected, Tessa. I don't know why, but you people seem to feel a tremendous amount of personal loyalty to that young man."

"We do," she confirmed. "And if you'd ever spent much time with him -which I gather you haven't; I doubt Kevin much enjoyed the circumstances of your meeting- you'd understand, too. He has... I don't know the word for it. Charisma? Something like that, I guess. We only knew him for six months, but, Uncle Yuri, he could _lead._ It's obvious now that it's not something he _likes_ to do -he usually prefers to work alone- but that makes it all the easier to follow him. And, of course," she added thoughtfully, "Rachel had an additional reason to be loyal, since she was in love with him... and we were all very close, anyway, like family." She closed her eyes. "And another reason I'll obey his call is because I owe him. We all do, for not realizing what was really going on back then. If we had, we would've..."

"Would've what?" Joule asked kindly.

"Killed Oracle and just about everybody involved with Medical Section, and gotten out of there," the super-soldier said positively. "Maybe taken out Durandal, too, along the way, and certainly Patrick Zala."

Amalfi blinked. "Wait, wait. What do you mean, Durandal? What does he have to do with...?"

His niece looked at him in mild surprise. "You mean you didn't know? Le Creuset devised the unit, and Zala authorized it, but Durandal was involved, too. I don't know how deeply, but I saw him at the lab a few times... and he knew all about our mission, background, and genesis."

* * *

Kevin was, much to his chagrin, doing paperwork when his visitor turned up; his recent, hidden preparations had taken up enough of his time that the work he was _supposed_ to be doing had started piling up... which was why he wasn't exactly displeased when someone knocked at his office door.

"There's a reporter here to see you, Boss," Meryl Steiglitz announced over the intercom; following the war, she'd settled right in at Onishi Mansion, fulfilling essentially the same role she did on the _Dominion:_ guarding her captain's door, and vetting his visitors so that he wasn't disturbed overmuch. Exactly why she did this, Kevin wasn't certain; nor did he really mind.

"A reporter, eh? Send her in, Meryl." There was only one "reporter" it could be, after all; only one freelancer_ hadn't_ been scared off within weeks of the Baron's return, and only one would get past Meryl's screening that easily.

As he suspected, it was a brown-haired young woman who stepped through the door, a camera hanging from her neck. "Hi, Kevin," she greeted. "It's been a while."

Kevin nodded, standing. "It has indeed, Mir. Good to see you." He motioned to a chair, while he settled into one himself; a comfortable armchair, much better than the desk chair he'd been using. "So, what brings you here? I thought you were out of the country, visiting places hit by the colony debris."

"I was," Miriallia Haw acknowledged. "But I've about finished with that, so I figured I'd stop by here before getting the photos published." She tilted her head. "I saw you, you know, when you were on your way down."

He nodded, absently rubbing the scar that bisected his face. "Yeah, I was involved in that mess; capped a bad week full of disasters with a cataclysm. But how'd you know _I_ was there? Unless maybe Tolle mentioned it or something..."

"Kevin," she said patiently, a small smile on her lips, "I don't know as much as you do about ZAFT mobile suit development, but it didn't take a former _Archangel_ CIC crewman to realize who was piloting that Stormhawk-look-alike. For one thing, only you would fire a beam that big." They both chuckled at that -Kevin's personal machine had been known for titanic displays of firepower during the last war- but then Mir sobered. "And no, I haven't talked to Tolle. Not lately."

Kevin nodded again; that was territory they'd been over before. Still... "You never did tell me exactly why you two broke up," he said quietly.

Mir shrugged. "I grew up," she said simply. "He didn't. At least... not the same way. After you offered him that job..."

He winced. "Sorry about that."

She shook her head. "I don't blame you, Kevin; it's something he obviously was ready to do... and he wasn't quite the same as he was back at Heliopolis. Not anymore." Another shrug. "We were just different, that's all; we realized we weren't quite right for each other, parted ways, and kept in touch as friends." She glanced around then, a new thought occurring to her. "Ah... he isn't here right now, is he?"

Kevin shook his head. "Nyet. The office systems haven't picked anything up."

Mir relaxed at that; she truly wasn't bitter about her breakup with Tolle, and did still consider him a friend, but she also didn't want to discuss the matter right in front of him... which was a distinct possibility these days, even if she never even saw him.

For that was something about Tolle Koenig that even Kevin found disconcerting. The war had changed him; it wasn't obvious at first, and even when it began to show, it was very subtle. But when Kevin offered him a job as an intelligence officer -or in layman's terms, a spy- Tolle had jumped at the chance with his usual enthusiasm.

Only this time, the enthusiasm had taken a strange form, because of the training he went through. Absolutely determined to excel at his new career, Tolle had first gone through advanced pilot training in his stealth mobile suit, the Wraith, and then undergone variations of the information-gathering and assassination training Kevin himself had taken, years before. Tolle had gone in as someone with the so-called "fighter jock" mentality, which had led him to use stealthy ambush tactics with reckless enthusiasm during the war, treating it almost as a game.

He'd come out of it seeming as carefree as before, but somewhat paranoid, and with total dedication to his job.

Tolle had on his person at almost all times a small optic camouflage unit, reverse-engineered from Invictus' armor, powered by the same type of RTG that ran Kevin's augmentation. Using it, he'd become an almost frighteningly effective intelligence gathering operative, spending a lot of time deep-cover, totally invisible as he went about his duties. After spending months in various cities and space colonies that way, Tolle had become something of a wraith himself, rarely showing himself to anyone at all. Kevin had little doubt he was often walking the streets of Orb when not on some kind of mission, but if so, it was almost impossible to tell. Tolle was still friendly, and enthusiastic -in his area- but the things he'd seen at the end of the war had given him a liking for the shadow world, and so he kept his optic camouflage on except when he was sure the location was secure.

Kevin had once jokingly called him the Invisible Man. Tolle had not denied it.

In any case, the fact that Tolle was capable of rendering himself invisible to ordinary forms of detection, and had long since learned to shield himself from Kevin's empathic senses, had led Kevin to install a number of other security devices around his office. His semi-tame spy couldn't access his private study -getting into there required more than mere stealth- but his working office was another matter, and he didn't care to be subject to any practical joke Tolle might come up with.

Fortunately, none of Tolle's skills included any way to fool _olfactory_ detectors.

"Well," Kevin went on after a moment, "you might be interested to know that I met Dearka not long ago, during the battle over Junius Seven. He asked about you."

Mir brightened. "He did? And how is he doing?"

"Well enough, from what I could tell." He smiled. "Nobody's tried to assassinate him lately, if that's what you mean."

She blushed at that; Kevin was clearly referring to the first time she and Dearka Elsman had really met: the day she tried to kill him, then saved him from a similar attempt by Flay. "I'm, ah, glad to hear that. Tell him I said hi the next time you talk to him, will you?"

"Of course." Kevin knew that Mir and Dearka had formed a sort of bond from the experience in _Archangel_'s Infirmary, and become close friends by the end of the war; he also knew they'd kept in touch, though exactly how far it had gone since Tolle's... departure, he was not certain. "So," he said, changing the subject, "anything interesting in those photos?"

"Actually, yes." Mir dug into a pocket, withdrew a photograph, and handed it to him. "This was taken in Beijing, two days ago. As you've probably heard, it was hit hard during the incident, which was why I was there in the first place... but I saw something there that kind of bothered me. See the old guy in the picture? He looked familiar somehow, so I thought I'd drop by and see if you recognized him."

Kevin took one look, closed his eyes, and calmly said, "Solkin syn."

She tilted her head; she didn't know exactly what the curse meant, but that it _was_ a curse she did not doubt. "So you _do_ recognize him, then."

"Kind of hard not to. That's Dad."

Mir inhaled sharply. "But... but you said he died years ago!"

"That's what I thought, too. Unfortunately, the bastard is still very much alive... a state of affairs I intend to change as soon as possible." As always, he was in total control of his body, keeping any sign of his emotions from his body language, but the ice in his jade eyes told the tale of the murderous fury he held toward his father. "He's behind Snake Eater, and Frank's death."

She closed her eyes. "No wonder... I guess he _is_ the most likely suspect, isn't he? But why reappear now? And what does he want?"

"Devil if I know. I never understood him when I was a kid, and I don't understand him now. What I _do_ know is that he has some kind of plan." Kevin motioned with his jaw toward the ceiling; or rather, the vacuum of space far above. "You were there the day I found Father's notes aboard _Amaterasu;_ you know the true story behind Project Guardian. I was created to be a soldier, and we know how now... but we still don't know why. He had some kind of long-range planning in mind, clearly, something that would take years, perhaps even decades to bring to fruition. We also know that whatever his reasoning, it wasn't for the good of Orb. He'd spread too many cover stories around for him _not_ to have been about something underhanded."

"You're probably right," Mir agreed. She remembered the _Amaterasu_ very well; the missing fifth _Izumo_-class cruiser, it had been controlled by the Onishi family. Appropriate, since the Seirans controlled _Susanoo,_ a name from the same tale as _Amaterasu._

The ship had been lost for four years, ever since the supposed death of John Tyler Onishi; Gai Murakumo's mercenaries had stumbled across it in orbit, and Murakumo himself had passed along the information to Kevin (who had, in the past, worked with the Serpent Tail mercenaries). Following the _Amaterasu_'s rediscovery as a derelict drifting in orbit, Kevin had left Athrun and Leona guarding Cagalli, various corporate colleagues overseeing Morgenroete's affairs, and led a small expedition to the ship, consisting of himself, Mir, Tolle, and Meryl Steiglitz.

_Amaterasu_ had clearly been long-abandoned... and not under the best of conditions. Some compartments were fire-blackened and open to space; others were still occupied by members of the crew, dead in some long ago battle. Exactly what had happened was still a mystery... but the ship had provided the clues to several others, in the form of incomplete notes left by the previous Baron Onishi in the ship's main databanks.

The notes might not have revealed the _purpose_ behind Kevin's creation, but the details of the project itself had been enough to put him on guard... which had allowed him and his people at Artemis to find Snake Eater before it could kill him.

And they had made him very wary indeed when his father turned up alive... alive, and apparently still scheming.

"So what are you going to do?" Mir asked now. "Now that you know he's around, and on Earth?"

Kevin sighed. "Devil if I know. I'm very good at subtlety, tovarisch... but Father is in a class of his own. I never realized that when I was a kid, but now, looking back... He's another Machiavelli, and I have no idea what his ultimate goal is. I know he wants _me_ out of the picture, but I think that's more because of the threat I represent, or because I failed in whatever mission he had in mind for me, than because I'm his true objective." He absently flexed his metal hand. "The one bit of good news is that there's no way Father can know everything that's happened to me in the past five years. Doubtless he knows of ABADDON -he always did have his ways of getting information- but my arm... Well, there are any number of people who know of it, but none of them are likely to tell him about it."

She nodded. Outside of the crews of the four ships from the war, only members of ZAFT and the Seiran family would know anything about Kevin's cybernetic arm. Only a handful even in ZAFT were aware of it, and none of them were likely to know Onishi... and given the traditional antipathy between Onishi and Seiran, that avenue was also blocked.

"Well," Mir said at length, standing, "I guess I'd better go. I need to get these photos published. See you later, Kevin."

"You too, tovarisch."

* * *

Some hours later, Kevin found himself deep beneath the mansion, in one of the lowest levels of the underground complex. This was the harbor level, where presently two ships were lying dormant. One he was very familiar with, and very fond of, having passed most of the previous war aboard her.

The other was the fifth ship of the _Izumo_-class, the _Amaterasu._ Just as _Susanoo_ was controlled by Seiran, _Izumo_ by Sahaku,and _Kusanagi_ by Athha, _Amaterasu_ was owned and operated by the Onishi family. Built shortly before the death of Irena Onishi and supposed death of her husband, she had not been in service long before vanishing without a trace in orbit. Within a week of the "accident" at Porta Panama, around the same time Kevin was being kidnapped by ZAFT, all contact was lost with the ship, and _Amaterasu_ was presumed "lost to causes unknown".

Now Kevin walked across the gangway to board the ship, noting the remaining scorch marks from severe hits in some unknown battle. Exactly what had happened, he didn't know; nor did Gai Murakumo, who had expressed puzzlement when he reported the find to the Baron.

Whatever it had been, it had left _Amaterasu_ a gutted wreck, completely depressurized and heavily battered, with hull breaches everywhere and most its weapons gone. Kevin was privately certain that his father had actually relocated to the ship after Irena's death, only to find something else waiting for him... something from which he had fled, leaving his loyal crew to die.

_Although,_ he admitted unwillingly, _more likely they practically had to shove him into an escape pod. Whatever he might be doing to me, whatever he might have done to Frank, he _was_ loyal to those he could still use. You old bastard... what the blazes were you up to, anyway?_

He began to walk the silent, ghostly decks, noting absently that repairs were almost complete, after a long year of restoration. Soon, he would send _Amaterasu_ back to space; one thing about the base's facilities that he had only learned after taken over his father's position was that, over the years, the Onishi family had actually found a fully-functional mass driver here. It was highly experimental, consisting of a tube similar to a capital ship's linear catapults, to completely encase the departing ship and thus remove the element of water resistance from the equation. Only when brought fully online would the mass driver be even noticeable, when its end extended a few meters beyond the surface of the water to provide the ship with access to the open air.

In truth, Kevin would be almost glad to see the ship leave his harbor; he fully intended to use her if the need arose, but he found _Amaterasu_ positively eerie; knowing that it had been his father's personal ship in his plan -whatever it was or had been- was bad enough, but knowing that it had drifted as a Flying Dutchman for four years, its crew still aboard, was enough to send shivers down even _his_ spine. _I can watch a thousand people die without blinking, observe terrible damage being inflicted on a human body, but creepiness... I just can't deal with ghosts._

Presently he found his way to _Amaterasu_'s Bridge, which was also intact once again, save for a few scorch marks. Something he'd not been aware of until his return to the Barony was that his Uncle Carl Castile had been in command of the ship at the time of her disappearance... and so, when he and his small team entered the Bridge, they found Frank Castile's father, still in the captain's chair, wearing a spacesuit with a shattered faceplate.

Frank had not appeared surprised, or even particularly upset, when Kevin told him; but then, he'd known long since that this, or something like it, must've happened, and so had long come to terms with it. Kevin, on the other hand, had taken something of a shock from it. His family kept shrinking all the time... his father -he thought- his mother, the man who had been, for all practical purposes, his brother,... and Frank himself...

And now he had other issues, which were potentially far more dangerous to those around him.

He was staring out the Bridge viewport, looking at nothing, when Leona Colde stepped through the hatch behind him. Dressed mostly in black, including boots, pants, and gloves, she wore a white shirt and a short, black leather jacket, with a collar of white fur; the ensemble was completed by a combat knife on the left side of her gunbelt and a massive Israeli Military Industries Mark IX Desert Eagle autopistol, with a seven-inch barrel and chambered in .50 caliber Action Express. Originally from Kevin's own sizable collection of weapons, it had also once been used by Mu La Flaga in an attempt to kill Jack Carter... and the sheer stopping power of its bullets might well have done it, had Kevin himself not battered the clone to a bloody pulp.

"Spooky place," she remarked, glancing around. "Though I see you've at least gotten rid of the old decor." As a former member of ZAFT's Next-Generation Special Forces, she was similarly inured to blood and death. "Any particular reason you wanted to meet me here, Kevin?"

"Yes," he replied, not turning. "It's one place that I'm fairly sure not even Max will wander into just now. We have... sensitive matters to discuss, some of which not even our AI friend is cleared for. Here, there are no recording devices, and no copy of what I'm about to tell you will be entered into record."

Leona raised an eyebrow, intrigued. "And just what, exactly, do you want to discuss? You're being even more cryptic than usual, mon ami."

"I've got a proposal for you," Kevin said, turning at last. "I brought you in on my plans because, as I said, I need a partner... someone I can trust, and someone who can keep up with me. There aren't many people who can do that, and of them, you're the only one who shares my general viewpoint. Kira and I, for example, have... fundamental disagreements on tactics, particularly in regards to my private missions."

She nodded; she knew Kira had long since given up trying to convince Kevin not to indulge in vengeance attacks, or to change his tendency toward obliterating any Earth Forces unit that got in his way, but that did not mean they'd make a very effective team in most circumstances. Besides which, Kira was a mobile suit pilot, with no real experience on the ground, while Leona was a former special forces operative who was as at home with a sniper rifle as with a mobile suit's controls. "So... what's the proposal?"

She found it somewhat surprising that he hesitated; whatever it was, it appeared to be a touchy subject with him. "In the course of its research at Artemis," Kevin began at last, "Prometheus Unchained has also conducted a thorough examination of my body... and the machinery within. It's not a course I suggest lightly, and I wouldn't at all if I didn't know ZAFT has already partially succeeded in resurrecting the technology, but it is now possible for the facilities at Artemis to perform cybernetic augmentation."

Leona's eyes widened. She hadn't known what to expect from this meeting, but what he appeared to be leading up to certainly wasn't it. "Are you suggesting...?"

"Da. As I said, it's not something I suggest lightly, but we _have_ managed to reverse-engineer most of my systems, and Doctor Devlin, from _Dominion,_ believes that it was not, in fact, the augmentation process itself that caused my... less than pleasant experience five years ago. Or it _shouldn't _have, anyway. According to him, the Medical Section surgeons may have been under orders from Oracle to make the process more unpleasant, possibly to help weaken my resistance to the psychotropic drugs." He shrugged. "I wouldn't know; I don't really remember. In any case, if you choose to accept, you _can_ undergo the process, become one of us... and with that, you'll be able to fly any machine in our inventory, up to and including Foxhound, if the need arises."

She started to speak, then paused, thoughts racing. _This isn't something he'd propose on the spur of the moment, _she thought shrewdly. _He's frightened by something... No doubt he _does_ want me to able to keep up with him properly, but there's more to it than that. I can sense it from his emotions. What is it...?_

"I'm not saying yes," Leona said at last, "and I'm not saying no, either. Before I decide, I need to know what it is that you're so frightened by."

Kevin closed his eyes. "That, tovarisch, is why I chose this place for our meeting. That's the part of this conversation that I want no record of." He turned to face the viewport again. "I have been told, by my own former teacher, that Case Ragnarok -a shoot-on-sight order implemented in case of rogue Destroyers- was declared five years ago, and remains in effect today. She herself would not act on it unless she had no other choice... but I fear she may have an alternative that's even worse."

She tilted her head. "What kind of 'alternative'?"

He shrugged. "I suspect, from things Delta, Oracle, and various in Medical Section let slip, that there is, within my augmentation, a system that, with the proper command codes, could give another Destroyer complete control over my body, via my implants. I don't know exactly what it is -if I did, I would've found and removed it years ago- but there's a strong possibility she could use it to keep me under control. For that matter, a normal human, with the proper computer support, could probably make us of it... and _that_, tovarisch, I find _very_ frightening. Such a system could be used to make me do _anything..._ including hurt or kill those close to me."

Leona nodded slowly. "I see what you're getting at... and I don't think I like what you're leading up to, mon ami."

"I don't like it either," Kevin said bluntly. "But it has to be said. I need you, preferably augmented, because if someone _does_ take control of me in that way, you're the only one who will have both the ability and the will to kill me."

The words had finally been said, and a chill wind seemed to blow through the compartment; and as it passed, it fanned a small blaze of anger to life in Leona's mind. "You're crazy," she said, almost snapping out the words. "It would never come to that... and even if it did, can you imagine how Kira or Cagalli would-"

"This isn't a joke, soldier," Kevin barked, his voice shifting abruptly from nobleman to military commander. "Nor is it a matter we can afford to debate. Do you have any conception of what I'm capable of, with my systems fully active? We were made to destroy entire _armies,_ Leona. Twelve of us could've taken on hundreds; I proved that the day I killed over a hundred Blue Cosmos terrorists and took apart a pair of main battle tanks with my bare hands in a single battle. You've never seen me at my height, so maybe you don't realize this... but if someone else gets control of me, I _cannot_ be permitted to act. Do you understand me? The lives of more people than I like to think about that ride on me being _stopped_ if that should happen."

Leona drew back, startled by the sheer ferocity of his response. _He's serious,_ she realized. _The appearance of his new ABADDON unit really has him spooked... and I don't blame him. Well..._ She thought it over for several minutes, considering. For one thing, she personally considered it unlikely that such a situation _would_ arise; judging from what she knew, and what Kevin had said, only Arkanian was likely to have the codes to begin with, and she clearly wouldn't use them in such a fashion. In that case, Leona could instead focus on the ABADDON instructor, who, while no doubt dangerous, could be killed, possibly easier than Kevin himself.

On the other side of the coin was the amount of help she could be, if she accepted the offer. There were few augmented soldiers even now, all of them either freelancers or ZAFT, which would give them a decided edge if they _did_ get involved in the war with the Earth Forces. It would also enable her to use whatever mobile suits Kevin had constructed to their fullest ability... and, just incidentally, make _her_ harder to kill.

In the end, Leona's decision was probably inevitable. She'd once been with the Next-Generation Special Forces, so she was no stranger to unusual combat abilities or medical experiments... and she _had_ given her loyalty, complete and unconditional, to this nation.

And the young man now asking for her help was the one who'd made it all possible.

"All right, Kevin," she heard herself say. "I accept... and may it never come to the scenario you just described." Then she shrugged and continued, "When I saw that imposter, I thought you called me in for a special job."

When Leona had defected from ZAFT, she had told Kevin during her debriefing that the NGSF also acted as an official hit squad... and that assassinations were one of NGSF's specialties.

Kevin just looked at her, eyes cold when she mentioned the fake Lacus, "No, for now leave her be, but in the future if she becomes detrimental, you may erase her."

To this the ex-NGSF could only give a cold smile. "With pleasure."

* * *

Somehow, Athrun wasn't surprised to find the woman impersonating Lacus Clyne waiting for him when he got to the hotel where he was staying. "Hello, Athrun!" she greeted cheerfully, taking his arm.

"I... ah... thought I might run into you," he managed, caught a little off-guard. "Look... I know you're not Lacus; Chairman Durandal admitted it, anyway. So.. Who are you, really?"

"My real name is Meer Campbell," she replied, still smiling. "Still, you'd better call me Lacus in public, to keep up appearances." Her smile widened. "Why don't we talk about it over dinner, hm?"

"Uh... sure..." Athrun was beginning to feel more than a little off-balance; Meer looked like Lacus, but most certainly did not _act_ like her. At least, not like the Lacus he'd known since she first met Kira...

A few minutes later, they were outdoors, eating, and Meer had another question to ask. "So," she asked tentatively, "did you see my concert?" At Athrun's nod, she further asked, "Was it... was it much like the real Lacus would've done it?"

"Yes, it was," Athrun admitted. "I'm sure only those who know exactly where Lacus is would've realized you weren't her."

Meer smiled widely. "Thank you! Thank you very much!" The look on her face was pure delight, which Athrun also found disconcerting; he wasn't used to Lacus -or even someone with Lacus' face- acting so... enthusiastic. "I've always been a big fan of Lacus, you see," she explained after a moment. "I always used to sing her songs, but I never got anywhere with my singing, because everything thought I sounded like Lacus. But then the Chairman himself called me, and, well... how could I refuse? He needs me..."

"He needs Lacus Clyne," Athrun corrected gently. "Not you. That's why he chose you."

That diminished her enthusiasm only slightly. "I know," she admitted. "I admire Lacus Clyne, you know; people need her, not me. But as long as I can be of help, I'm happy to."

"I can understand that," he acknowledged. "But... there's something you should know. I think even Lacus herself might be understanding about this... but I don't think her brother will."

Meer's eyebrows went up. "I didn't know Lacus had a brother."

"Most people don't. Even they didn't know until two years ago; before that, they thought they were cousins. But Baron Kevin Onishi _is_ Lacus Clyne's brother -if the previous Baron hadn't formally accepted Kevin as his heir, I guess _his_ name would be Clyne, too- and he's very protective of her." Athrun met her gaze levelly. "He also happens to be Kevin _Walker,_ and trying to deceive him won't work. Not only does he know _exactly_ where the real Lacus is, but he also has a wide array of ways to prove in an instant -to himself, at least- that you aren't her. He's also not going to be happy that you're doing this. _I_ can understand where the Chairman is coming from on this, but Kevin doesn't think that way. He's like a brother to me... but even I know that he doesn't care much about the world at large. Tread carefully around him. I don't think he'd kill you under the current circumstances... but if you take one step out of line, he just might."

She blinked. "The Black Asp is really that dangerous? I'd always thought he was a hero, after what he did two years ago."

Athrun actually chuckled at that. "Let me give you a piece of advice: don't call him a hero to his face. Shinn Asuka once derisively called him a 'legend', and he wasn't exactly impressed. He'd say that he's just a man... and you don't want to say anything he doesn't like any more than you have to. He's not going to like you very much."

"I'll... keep that in mind," Meer promised. Then she leaned forward, an intent look on her face. "Now, could you please tell me about Lacus? What does, how she does it, what she likes..."

Athrun shortly found himself in a long discussion about the real Lacus and how she lived, listening to and answering the man questions Meer had... while, in the back of his mind, he thought about many things.

_"A name is what defines something, and if the name is false... well, then, does that make the thing which it defines false, as well?"_

He remembered well Chairman Durandal's words on the matter, and he had to wonder if that applied here, as well. _I guess that's something I may never know. I don't know anything about Meer Campbell, except that she wants to become Lacus... And what about Durandal's proposal? I remember Kevin and Kira talking about the "power to make a difference"... Is that burden mine, as well?_

Athrun suspected that was a question he could only answer for himself. Kevin and Kira long since made their own decisions... now it was time to make his own.

* * *

Cagalli Yula Athha sat in her office, pensively staring at nothing. She had good reason to be preoccupied, under the circumstances; Yuna Roma Seiran had only recently left, and that which they'd discussed still left her feeling mildly disgusted... and frightened of what she was going to have to do now.

_How do I tell him?_ she thought nervously. _I have to tell him soon, or it will be even worse... but how? How badly will it hurt him?_ She knew he'd survived much in his life, perhaps even worse than this... but the way his mind was now...

But it was for the best, Cagalli had -reluctantly- decided. He'd become so distant in the last few days. Obviously very concerned with affairs of his own... and it would not be right of her to pull him into her own responsibilities now. He clearly had something of his own, something very important, to attend to... perhaps something that would affect his entire life. She didn't know; she just knew that he wouldn't tell her what it was. _Doesn't he trust me? Or... is he trying to keep me safe? Either way... this is for the best. I'm sorry... but this has to be done._

Cagalli finally sighed, lifted her head, and activated her intercom. "Get me Baron Onishi," she told her secretary. "Tell him... I need to talk to him, as soon as possible. It's very important."

_"Yes, My Lady."_

She leaned back in her chair; the die was cast. All that remained to be seen was how badly Kevin would explode... and whether he'd ever forgive her.

* * *

Author's note: The nuclear attack over, the PLANTs must now decide how to respond to this attack on their very existence... even as Athrun Zala struggles to make his own decision, while Cagalli Yula Athha prepares to deliver bad news to someone close to her.

Meanwhile, another conspiracy forms in the PLANTs, as former members of the government recruit a new ally...

Well, this chapter is up rather sooner than even I expected; unfortunately, it probably isn't the most interesting, and it's also rather short, compared to recent chapters. Still, I think I can promise that Chapter 11 will be neither as short nor as uninteresting. Till then, let me know how this one was. -Solid Shark


	11. Chapter 11: Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_It had come to this._

_Operation Spit Break was the NGSF's biggest operation by far and they were given the honor of being part of the initial strike force, who would clear out the defenses of JOSH-A and help to break through its defensive gates inside. At first, she had thought that their target would be Panama, but just shortly before they launched Sato had informed her that the attack would not be on Panama but rather Alaska, where the fabled Archangel lay docked._

_Leona had heard about this vessel throughout various sources and she couldn't help but be impressed since the Archangel and her twin guardians, the Strike and an unknown mobile suit, had fended off attacks from different elite pilot teams. _

It's too bad that the Strike's pilot got killed_, thought Leona, disappointed, _a Natural pilot that's able to beat some of ZAFT's finest is a worthy opponent. _Then she felt a slight shake within the cockpit of her white CGUE, which indicated that drop pod she was in had been launched, and that meant that Operation Spit Break had begun._

_Ignoring the increase in gravitational pressure, Leona activated her commset in her helmet and addressed the rest of the NGSF,_

"_Get ready to rumble, ladies and gentlemen," Leona began with a monotone voice, with everyone in the unit used to her laconic speeches, "this will be our finest moment, this is where we finally crush the Earth Alliance once and for all, and most importantly, this is where the NGSF will truly be recognized as the best of the best in ZAFT. Do you get me?"_

"_We get you, ma'am!" came the unified response_

"_Good. In less than a minute we will reach JOSH-A's outer defenses, so expect some resistance; but I expect each and every one of you to get through this alive, do you hear me?" asked Leona. As she spoke, she felt the drop pod pass through the atmosphere and begin opening its protective covers to release its occupants._

"_We hear you ma'am!"_

_To Leona this would be her final battle, she had gotten her vengeance on those who killed her family long and this would be her last act as a loyal soldier of ZAFT. After this operation she would personally hand Sato her resignation and go back to the orphanage where she grew up at, then head back to France afterwards. There she would wait patiently for him and live out their days in peace, once they had reunited and there was nothing in the world that would get between Leona and her happiness._

_Nothing…_

_Leona made her CGUE jump out of the drop pod as it fully opened, jumping straight to where the fighting was fiercest. She could feel that the rest of the NGSF were right behind her, eager to prove themselves as the swords that would bring ZAFT the promised victory. _

"_Unleash hell!" Leona shouted as she and the rest of the NGSF joined the battle of Alaska.  
_

* * *

"You've agreed to _what?"_

The outburst from Baron Kevin Onishi was enough to make Cagalli flinch; she hadn't heard him shout like that in a long, long time, and _never_ at _her._ Coming from him, it was almost the equivalent of an astonished screech.

Unfortunately, it was very probably justified.

"I... I've accepted Yuna Roma Seiran's proposal of marriage," she repeated, unable to lift her head to meet his gaze. "I... I'm sorry, Kevin. But... but I don't see that I have much choice. We need to present a united front right now, and... it's for the good of Orb. The people need-"

"The people?" Kevin stared at her, unable to believe what he was hearing. "Cagalli, have you taken leave of your senses? You've never talked like this before; you've never acted like the people of Orb _owned _you... You can't be serious about this!" The idea that she _could_ do this... and with a man he hated, no less... After everything that had happened, he just didn't know that he could take this.

Kevin couldn't even accept that it was happening yet. Cagalli had called him to her office, and so he'd come, utterly perplexed but willing to go along with it... only to be hit by the worst news he'd received in years.

Cagalli swallowed hard. "Kevin, please, you have to understand... this is for the best... you know? In a time like this, the people need good news... something to lift their spirits..."

"That sounds like the sort of garbage Yuna spouts," he bit out. "And that slimy bastard cares _nothing_ for you, don't you realize that?" His hands, both flesh and cybernetic, clenched into fists. "What about _us,_ Cagalli? After so long, you can't just..."

She breathed deeply, fighting for calm. "Kevin, I... I don't know what to say. But... there's more to this than just us. We have to consider the needs of the nation, too. There's... blast it, Kevin, don't you understand?" she said desperately. "I'm the Chief Representative! I have duties to both the government and the people, and no matter what you or I may want, there are some things that have to be done!, for the sake of the people who rely on us!"

Kevin's jade eyes had taken on an icy quality that Cagalli had never before seen directed at her... but his words served only to stir a different emotion. "I don't care about the world," he hissed, "and you've known that for over ten years. The world is not my responsibility, nor does it deserve my loyalty. What I care about is _us!_ Cagalli, we've known each other all our lives... we've been together for over two years now-"

"You may not care about the world, but we have to think about the consequences of our actions!" Cagalli snapped back. "Now you're starting to sound selfish! You _know_ that, as heads of two of the Five Noble Families of Orb, we have responsibilities-"

"Don't talk to me about responsibility!" he fired back, hands now twitching under the pressure he was exerting. "I was responsible for a team of twelve super-soldiers, remember? Okay, so I botched that, too, but at least I didn't let them get out of hand! I fought with the _Archangel_ and the _Dominion_ for longer than you did during the war, and I kept my people alive as best as I could. I've spent two bloody years keeping Morgenroete on track, while at the same time keeping _you_ safe! I know _all_ about responsibility, thank you... and I think a man has a right to be a little selfish after he's incinerated himself a time or two, and nearly blown himself to atoms to save this ungrateful planet!"

Tempers were beginning to flare dangerously, as pent up frustration and tension was poured forth, used as ammunition between the two; beyond the office's door, Cagalli's secretary was profoundly grateful not to be in that room.

"Is that Onishi talking, or Walker?" Cagalli said now, dangerously. "That doesn't sound like a nobleman-"

"No, it doesn't! It sounds like a man who's been killed on four separate occasions, killed more people than he cares to remember, and right now is the target of so many conspiracies he needs a scorecard just to keep track of them all!" Kevin's right hand flexed convulsively, and the old ache in his shoulder -where his original right arm had been practically blown off- started to throb for the first time in years. "Is it really so much to ask for _something_ in return, after everything I've been through? Some happiness in a life that's been fraught with so much death?"

"This isn't the end of the world, Kevin," she retorted, distantly appalled by the way she was addressing him. "You've still got your friends, and it's not like we'll never see each other-"

"It won't be the same!" He breathed in deeply, fighting for control; it had been a long time since his temper had frayed its leash this badly. "Two years ago, I could've accepted this, and stayed on. I wouldn't have liked it, because I think Yuna Roma Seiran is a slimy insect who deserves nothing better than a giant boot to fall from the sky and squish him, but I could've done it. But that was before I let myself face how I feel for you, Cagalli, and I'm telling you, I can't _do_ it!"

"As a noble of Orb-" Cagalli began, but he cut her off again.

"You want a nobleman, then just give the job back to my father!" Kevin snapped. Reaching up to his collar, where the insignia of an Orb Ground Forces colonel was pinned, he tore the entire top of the tunic away, letting the fabric and the insignia drop. "If you're really set on this course... then I've got nothing more to do here. Let my father sort out this mess!" He turned then, and began to walk away.

Cagalli stared at him in sudden shock, both at his words and his actions. "Wait a minute... your father? But... but he's dead... And where are you going, Kevin? Wait!"

"I'm through waiting for you," he said, not bothering to turn. "I'll tell you this: my father is alive, and he's out to kill me... and he just might succeed. Unless my people pull a rabbit out of their collective hat, we probably won't meet again, because I'll be dead in a few months." His head did turn then, giving her one last icy regard. "I haven't been idle the last two years, you know. I've been conducting a great deal of research in preparation for a renewed war... and that research is the only reason this virus hasn't already killed me. Now it's going to be my refuge... because I can't stay here. I'm leaving Orb entirely, and I may never come back. Certainly not while that slimy toad still lives."

Her mouth gaped, and she knew it, yet she couldn't help it. It was too much, too fast; she'd known he'd react badly, but this... _He's... he's leaving... but... but..._ "Kevin," she heard herself say, "just give it some time. Please, everything will settle down; I know we can't be together, but-"

"I don't have any time left for you," Kevin said simply. "And tell Yuna this: if that treaty goes through, the Earth Alliance will never get anything of value from Morgenroete... and by doing this, he is making _me_ Orb's enemy." He snorted bitterly. "...So this is supposed to 'unite the country', huh? Yeah, sure... driving out one of the Five Noble Families will 'unite the country'." There was an odd catch in his voice, almost as though he were holding back tears... which was clearly impossible, since he'd never cried since the death of his mother, five years before. "The very best I can say is that I hope this doesn't backfire on you too badly... because I won't be around to pick up the pieces this time. I've got to go clean up as much of this mess as I can... with the only tools left to me."

Something about that clicked with what he'd said moments earlier about "research in preparation for a renewed war", and Cagalli's eyes widened. "Kevin? Kevin, what have you done?" This time, there was no answer, as the youth yanked open the office's door. _"What have you done?"_

The only answer was silence, as the young man walked out, head held high... and spirit broken.

And within the wounded tiger's mind, the persona of Baron Kevin Onishi cracked like a damaged mirror... and shattered into pieces forever.

* * *

It was a very different person who made his way along Orb's coastal roadways on the back of a motorcycle, black cloak fluttering in the wind of his passage. He was no longer Kevin Onishi, baron of Orb; that young man had long ago been destroyed in the fires of his own crucible, and what little remained had just shattered forever.

Nor, however, was he Kevin Walker, super-soldier. He was something in between, a shell of a man whose very purpose was in doubt. The one person he had always counted on above all others had just betrayed him... and with that betrayal, his world had changed completely.

_I have to... make a choice,_ the sole surviving product of John Tyler Onishi's Project GUARDIAN thought, racing toward the one refuge he had left in Orb. _I'm no longer the Baron, and I cannot remain in Orb... yet I'm in no shape to move on. I have to... pick up the pieces, before I can depart. It's the only way I can survive..._

Unknown to the conflicted youth, he was observed from afar by a gaze that was more than human. Standing on a hill over a kilometer away, the armored soldier known as Hyperion watched the former ABADDON commander through enhanced eyes and the image-enhancing visor of the battlesuit's helm. _You've been wounded again, haven't you, my friend,_ Hyperion thought, noting the expression on the young man's face. _This is wrong... You've suffered enough as it is, and now I see I've failed to protect you from whatever wounded you thus. Hm. I suppose it's true that a man's worst enemy is his own heart..._

Turning away with a sigh, the soldier melted away into invisibility.

* * *

_"You acted rashly, Lord Djibril,"_ the figure on one of the screens accused. _"You were too hasty in beginning this new war against the PLANTs so rapidly."_

_"And then,"_ another man concurred, _"you immediately retreated afer the nuclear attack failed! That shows indecision and weakness-"_

"Enough!" Djibril barked, angrily swatting several wine bottles off his desk, shattering them. "Leaving aside the fact that it was President Copeland who made the decision to pull back, not me, there wasn't exactly much choice... or didn't you notice that almost our entire force was wiped out in one blow from their nuclear countermeasure?"

_"Even so,"_ a third man put in, _"if you'd taken proper precautions _before_ declaring war..."_

"If you had objections, you should've said so at the time," Blue Cosmos' leader retorted. "I don't recall any of you disagreeing with the decision _then._ We all agreed on the timing of the new conflict; if you had doubts, now is a little late to bring them up."

_"...A point,"_ the first man conceded unwillingly. _"Very well, Lord Djibril, you've made your point. However, what do you propose we do now? Whoever deserves the blame for this fiasco aside, the attack _was_ a failure. Also, it seems clear that another element was present; a representative from another faction, perhaps, or another new ZAFT weapon."_

"I presume you're referring to the blue mobile suit of unknown type that was destroyed during the attack?" Djibril shrugged. "That unit was irrelevant; its pilot was clearly incompetent, and now is just as clearly dead. It was most likely some new ZAFT unit, yes... but with it destroyed, all it serves to do is bolster the case presented by whatever device they used to stop our attack. Clearly, they have something new, and _that_ is just another justification for us to wipe them out... completely."

The other man nodded. _"And the Crimson Tiger?"_

Djibril snorted. "You old men persist in bringing _him_ into these discussions... Listen to me: Kevin Walker is no longer a threat. If he were, he would've acted by now, and probably with a certain degree of force. As it is, he's nothing but a shadow of the enemy he once was, and as such we need not concern ourselves with him."

_"We still owe him for all the trouble he's caused over the years..."_

"Of course we do, but this is a matter of priorities, and the simple fact is that revenge against Walker is a lower priority than destroying the PLANTs. As long as we do nothing to actively provoke him, he'll remain as he is until we _do_ have time to... deal with him." He smiled coldly. "And when we do, of course, that _will_ be the end of the matter... at last."

* * *

Kira Yamato was waiting by the mansion's large oak double-doors in the entrance foyer long before his friend actually arrived. He'd felt, even from a distance, the tumultuous emotions that coursed through Kevin's mind. He didn't know exactly what had prompted it -even had Kevin been "broadcasting", his thoughts would've been just as chaotic as his emotions- but he could make a good guess... and suspected that the sandy-haired youth with need a great deal of moral support when he arrived home.

"You think something's happened with Cagalli?" Lacus said softly, standing next to him.

Kira nodded. "Yeah. I can't think of anything else that could make Kevin feel like that; not even Frank's death did this to him. That just made him angry... this has him more confused than I've ever known him to be." He shook his head. "And I think Yuna Seiran's probably involved in it somehow."

"Probably," Murrue agreed, joining them. "If you're right, it sounds like Yuna's finally gotten the better of Kevin in their long feud. The question is... how is Kevin going to react?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. I really don't."

A few minutes later, the oak doors practically exploded open, nearly flying off their hinges under the impetus of a cybernetic hand whose bearer no longer even cared to restrain its strength. And behind that hand stalked Kevin, his face a terrible mask, his body language almost screaming a combination of shock and anger. The top of his tunic was in tatters, as was the shirt beneath; he appeared not to care that he'd wrought grievous damage upon clothing more valuable than his motorcycle.

"Kevin... what happened?" Lacus asked gently.

"Cagalli... has accepted Yuna Roma Seiran's proposal... of marriage," Kevin said slowly, walking right on past. "Now, if you'll excuse me... I need to be alone for awhile."

He continued on toward the mansion's library, and though Kira called after him, he ignored further attempts at communication with him. He appeared physically drained, in a way his friends and family had never seen.

"What do we do?" Kira wondered, gazing after his friend. "We can't let him go on like this; it'll destroy him..." He glanced around. "Someone's gotta talk to him... but who? I don't think he'll listen to me right now; Cagalli's my sister, after all..."

"He probably isn't thinking straight right now," Lacus agreed. "And I think he would resent your insight into his thoughts and emotions right now, anyway. Perhaps Andrew...?"

Murrue shook her head. "No, he's... elsewhere, helping Leona prepare for her trip. Besides, this isn't like that time in Banadiya; I don't think Kevin's on the verge of suicide or anything. He _is_ hurting, though, and with this on top of all the other stresses his mind has been under lately..." She turned to the girl Mu La Flaga had once called the "Pink Princess", and gestured after Kevin. "Lacus, I think you and I had best talk to him. As you say, Kevin's liable to associate Kira with his sister right now, and he also wouldn't want someone looking into his head at the moment, so it'll have to be us."

Lacus nodded. "Yes, I think you're right, Murrue. Still... I think you should stay close by, Kira, in case he _does _want to talk to you."

"I will," Kira promised. "He's like a brother to me, remember."

* * *

The debate had been a long one, but the Supreme Council of the PLANTs had come to a decision at last. In truth, their verdict had been a forgone conclusion -the events of the previous day's battle had made that inevitable- but debate had raged on nonetheless.

_Perhaps,_ Gilbert Durandal mused, _because it's human nature to deny the unpalatable for as long as possible... until reality finally _does_ become blindingly obvious._

"Very well," he said now. "In accordance with this decision, ZAFT will now be deployed in an advanced defensive posture, in order to defend the rights we fought for in the last war, and were granted to us by the Junius Treaty, as recognized by all parties involved in the war." He swept his gaze over the Council, looking as suitably grave as any of them. "Understand this, however: this measure is not taken lightly. I only concur because the Earth Alliance has made it plain that we will once again have to fight to preserve our own existence, and because it is our duty to protect the autonomy we obtained through so much bloodshed. Even now, we must remember that we do this not to dominate the Earth, but merely to defend ourselves. We will take no action beyond what is necessary to accomplish that."

* * *

When the two of them entered the mansion's vast library, Murrue somehow wasn't surprised to see Kevin slumped in an armchair, next to the room's small bar. His eyes stared at nothing, and there was a vodka-filled glass in his hand.

It was also obvious that he'd managed to down two other glasses of the stuff before they even got there.

_He's never been hurt quite like this before,_ Murrue thought, simply watching him for several moments. _At least, not since Rachel Carver died, five years ago... And _no one_ has ever inflicted this kind of pain on him. He must see this as the greatest betrayal he's ever suffered... and maybe he's right._

She, herself, couldn't understand why Cagalli would make such a decision. Her feelings for Kevin had been obvious for years now... and it seemed clear, at least to Murrue, that this marriage virtually guaranteed that the treaty allying Orb with the Earth Alliance would be ratified, and that was something they'd _both_ fought against since the Seirans had first broached the idea.

_Is the political pressure really that hard to fight against? Or did something somehow convince Cagalli that this had to be done? But surely she knew what this would do to Kevin..._

"Are you all right, Kevin?" Murrue asked finally, taking the lead in opening the conversation.

Kevin didn't respond for several moments; and when he did, it seemed as though he wasn't even speaking to her. "That's one of the things I hate the most about what they did to me," he said, staring into his vodka. "I could forgive them almost all the changes they made to my body, but I'll _never_ forgive them for making it impossible for me to get drunk." Seemingly oblivious to his two listeners, he swirled the glass's contents around, gaze still locked on it. "My liver was modified to prevent that; and even if it hadn't been, most of my digestive tract was removed, and the rest modified, making room for the pharmacopeia. Now nothing goes to waste. That which doesn't keep my body healthy is recycled internally to supply power to my augmentation..."

"Why would you even try to get yourself drunk, Kevin?" Murrue said then, speaking up at last. "What could drive _you_ to that point?"

"I already told you what happened," he answered, and tossed off the drink. "The woman who meant more to me than life itself just cast me aside, in favor of a man whom I hate, from a family my family has hated for generations... and not even out of any genuine feeling. Oh, how I hate words like 'duty', and 'responsibility'. Those words are hollow when applied to government; they're nothing more than a cleverly-laid trap that bastard Yuna is using... and she fell right into it. Tell me, Murrue: what am I supposed to do now, when the one part of my life I always felt I could count on, even in the darkest times, is torn from me?"

Murrue could tell Lacus was getting ready to say something, anything to make her brother feel better... which was why she made sure to speak first. _Sympathy and polite nothings mean nothing to him,_ Murrue knew. _That's not how you deal with this man. Cagalli had to shoot him once to get some sense into him; looks like I'll have to administer the verbal equivalent._

"You've got two choices here, Kevin," Murrue said now, frowning at him. "And they depend on who you are, and who you want to be." Her gaze sharpened, staring into his now surprised jade eyes. "If you're Onishi, then accept what's happening and move on; if you're Walker, then look at yourself in the mirror, and remember who you used to be! Well?" she demanded then. "Are you Onishi, or Walker? You can no longer be both!"

Kevin simply stared at her in silence for several moments, startled out of his depression. _Onishi... or Walker... That's the choice I have to make, isn't it? I've tried to be two different people for so long now; all my life, really. But every time I've tried it, it's torn me apart... and now, only one of the personas can continue. After everything that's happened, only one..._

"With choice comes responsibility," he murmured, and slowly stood. "A choice... I guess I should've made a long time ago."

Lacus smiled, reached out, and squeezed his shoulder. She'd been surprised -and worried- by Murrue's verbal gambit, but it appeared to have worked. "You know I'm with you, Brother, whichever path you choose..." she whispered.

Kevin nodded, very slowly, and stepped past, heading back to the entrance foyer and the hidden door behind the holographic bookcase.

"What do you think he'll choose?" Lacus said then, glancing at Murrue.

The older woman shrugged. "I think he'll choose whatever's right for him. I've known him almost three years now, and I trust his judgment; even if it has to be jump-started by someone else, he always comes back to himself in the end." She smiled slowly. "But you know... I think the old Kevin is about to come back. I know you don't like how he acts in that persona, but..."

"It _is_ his _real_ personality," Lacus demurred. "I might wish that he was not so willing to fight, but... the politician in him died a long time ago, Murrue. That much was obvious during the war."

Murrue nodded. "You do realize, though, that there's no way he's going to stay out of the war now, don't you?"

"I know," the younger woman acknowledged. "But he's very good at what he does., and he always comes back. I don't want my brother to go out there and fight... but if that's what it takes to get him back, I'm willing to accept it."

* * *

"I'm against it," Cagalli said firmly, staring at her prime minister. "You're suggesting we ally ourselves with people who not only declared war against the PLANTs without provocation, but also virtually destroyed our own nation just two years ago!"

"Calm down, please," Yuna said, interrupting her tirade. "I understand the stress you must be under right now, Lady Cagalli, but this is no time to be childish." He hid a wince then, at the fiery look she shot him. Reminding her of the stormy interview she'd had with Kevin not long before had not, perhaps, been the best idea. "At any rate," he went on quickly, "we all know the Atlantic Federation can be... forceful at times. The entire world knows that, yes. But really, what choice do we have? If we shun the rest of the world, ally ourselves with ZAFT, we accomplish nothing but risk having a repeat performance of the very devastation you speak of."

Cagalli clenched a fist under the table, sweeping her gaze over her cabinet ministers' faces... and the empty chair that should've held another of them. "I'm not suggesting we ally ourselves with ZAFT," she said quietly. "I'm saying we should be exactly what we were two years ago: a neutral party, connected with neither side."

"I don't see how that could possibly work," the Defense Secretary protested. "It got us nowhere last time; this time, the firestorm could be even worse, with consequences lasting for years to come."

"I believe Baron Onishi would say that sometimes you have to stick to your principles, no matter the cost," she retorted.

"And just where _is_ Baron Onishi now?" Unato Seiran put in, looking significantly at the empty chair. "Why isn't he here to present his views on the matter?"

He wasn't honestly expecting an answer; in fact, he was rather pleased at having come up with something he considered unanswerable... until the moment the conference room door opened, and a twenty-ish woman with crimson eyes and obsidian hair stepped in. She, like the rest of them, was dressed in the garb of an Orb government official, but her jacket was black, not the usual deep purple.

"I'm afraid Baron Onishi had an urgent matter come up," the woman said smoothly, drawing back the chair and sitting. "Since he believed it unlikely he could return in time for this meeting, he sent me, instead."

Unato tilted his head. "And, you are...?"

"Max Walker," Max replied with a small smile. "I normally act as Baron Onishi's stand-in at Morgenroete when he's on business, but I'm also fully conversant with his political affairs. You might say I have a... computer-like memory for these things. I assure you, I've been deputized to carry out his duties until his return."

"I see..."

Cagalli barely hid an astonished stare as the discussion began to resume. She'd see the artificial intelligence known as Max manifest as a holographic copy of Rachel Carver before... but no hologram could pull out a chair and sit down in it. _I don't believe it... is that one of the projects Kevin said he was researching...?_

"At any rate," Unato said now, pulling her attention back to the debate, "I don't believe that we can solve this problem by remaining neutral. It's far too risky. I believe that our best choice is to solve it through a treaty, associating ourselves with the clear consensus of the rest of the world."

"Not quite the entire world, Mister Prime Minister," Max said quietly. "Nor even all of Orb. I can guarantee you that Baron Onishi _will_ fight you over this, My Lord. He'll fight it to the end."

"There are more concerns here than Baron Onishi's personal hatred of the Earth Alliance," Unato said patiently. "If we don't accept this treaty, we take the risk of Orb once again being scorched by war. And I don't believe I need to remind Baron Onishi -or you, Miss Walker- that the safety of our citizens is our utmost priority, as those entrusted by them to govern."

The debate was off again at that, but Cagalli could see exactly where it was leading, even with Max's dissent... and she herself was more than a little conflicted. The confrontation with Kevin had hurt her more deeply than she cared to admit to anyone... and she knew something not even the Seirans did not.

Max had not been speaking figuratively when she said Kevin would fight the Seirans to the end. Knowing Kevin as she did, he would _literally_ fight, with every tool at his disposal... and he himself had said that this treaty would make him Orb's enemy.

The point was brought home even more completely at the end of the debate, when they all stood again. Max looked straight at Unato, with a dangerous glitter in her crimson eyes. "You can say what you want about Orb being scorched by war if we don't sign this treaty, Mister Prime Minister," she said quietly. "But I think rushing into the war is going to make it _more_ likely, not less."

* * *

After the meeting was over, Cagalli caught up with Max in the hallway. She had a few questions for the AI -or whatever she was now- particularly since, on further reflection, her appearance was no longer identical to Rachel Carver's. She had the dead Destroyer's hair and eyes... but something about her face reminded Cagalli of Kevin.

And those crimson eyes, otherwise like images Cagalli had seen of Rachel Carver, had one feature Kevin's old flame had lacked: they glowed perceptibly, even in broad daylight. On closer inspection, they also possessed a curious quality that she'd occasionally noticed with Kevin, though only when at least partly changed into his zoanthrope form. The pupils were cat-like slits...

"I guess you've got a couple of questions for me," Max noted now, leaning back against the hall's wall. "Can't say I blame you for being surprised."

"Surprised?" Cagalli repeated. "That's one way of putting it; confused would be another. Last I remember, you were an artificial intelligence, without any physical form except Tolle's old mobile suit."

"The miracle of modern cybernetics and genetics," the other woman -who looked older, despite having been created only two years before- replied. "Well, don't blame this one on Kevin; he doesn't know anything about it... yet. See, as an AI program I had complete access to computers that run his BaseOps; and just about everything in a modern lab like the Project's is run by computers. Besides, I had the help of a few equally-crafty souls who work in the Project."

"Genetics... and cybernetics?" Cagalli mused (she might not have pursued the topic now had she not needed a distraction, however brief, from the current situation, both personal and political). "So... you had a body engineered for you... and then used neural interfacing like Kevin's implants to download yourself into the body's brain?"

"Exactly," Max confirmed. "Guess you were paying attention when Kevin talked about his augmentation systems... Anyway, yeah, a body was 'grown' in our labs, carefully crafted to not be truly 'alive' until I entered into it; kind of like the concept of cloning replacement limbs -something else we're sort of working on- except on a grander scale. Tricky, too, given the ethical implications if the engineering _hadn't_ gone right."

Cagalli nodded slowly. "I guess I can understand that... but where'd the genetic material come from?"

"Simplicity itself," the former AI said with a grin. "The Project already has quite a few samples of Kevin's genetic code -one of our primary goals is, after all, to analyze and decode the secrets of his genetic and cybernetic structure- so that served as the basis. It also produced some interesting side-effects, what with the zoanthrope genes; that's why my eyes look a little strange. But that, of course, could only provide half, unless we wanted the possibility of serious genetic errors. So... Well, a little background: eighteen months ago, Kevin finally got around to tracking down the exact location of the lifepod he used to escape ABADDON, five years ago. He'd recorded the location within his cortical implant, of course, so it wasn't that difficult... but the important thing isn't _where_ it was, but rather what was in it: blood, splattered on his clothes during the event, and so stained on the surfaces he touched within the pod. Blood... of the Destroyers he personally killed."

Cagalli's eyes widened. "Then... you're..."

"That's right," Max said, nodding. "It took us a while, even with modern forensics, but we finally isolated the various genetic data from the blood, and separated them out." She met the Chief Representative's gaze. "In a very real sense, I'm the daughter Kevin and Rachel never had the chance to have." She shrugged. "And that, My Lady, is my story. If you'll excuse me..."

She turned and left, leaving Cagalli to stare after her, feeling fully as conflicted now as before speaking with the newly-human woman.

It was only a minute later, though, when her attention was dragged back to the meeting and its aftermath, as Yuna Roma Seiran caught up with her, completely unaware of the exchange that had just taken place. "I'm sorry," he said quietly. "My comments were a little out of line, I think, and for that, I apologize."

"...It's all right," Cagalli murmured, looking away. "You... were right, I guess. I'm still immature..." _How true _that_ is,_she thought bitterly. _I had no choice but to give him up... while an AI throws away potential immortality to become his _daughter._ Maybe we really are meant to be apart..._

"It's all right," Yuna told her reassuringly, oblivious to her thoughts. "But... perhaps you should call it a day. You look tired, you know." He bent his head then, and lightly kissed her forehead.

Cagalli twitched in surprise, despite the decision she'd made hours before... but her reaction was hardly more than the one Yuna had when he glanced at her hand, and saw the gold ring she still wore, with the entwined, stylized letters _K_ and _C...  
_

* * *

"Una salus victus nullam sperare salutem."

The computer accepted the code, and the door in the chamber concealed by the holographic bookcase slid aside, permitting the lone figure in black to slip into the study.

His face quite as much a mask as the one that once covered most of his features, the wiry youth crossed to the large, oak desk, and paused before it.

_"I don't care about the world," he hissed, "and you've known that for over ten years. The world is not my responsibility, nor does it deserve my loyalty. What I care about is _us! _Cagalli, we've known each other all our lives... we've been together for over two years now-"_

_"Now you're starting to sound selfish! You know that, as heads of two of the Five Noble Families of Orb, we have responsibilities-"_

_"Don't talk to me about responsibility!" he fired back, hands now twitching under the pressure he was exerting. "I was responsible for a team of twelve super-soldiers, remember? Okay, so I botched that, too, but at least I didn't let them get out of hand! I fought with the _Archangel_ and the _Dominion_ for longer than you did during the war, and I kept my people alive as best as I could. I've spent two bloody years keeping Morgenroete on track, while at the same time keeping you safe! I know all about responsibility, thank you... and I think a man has a right to be a little selfish after he's incinerated himself a time or two, and nearly blown himself to atoms to save this ungrateful planet!"_

_"Is that Onishi talking, or Walker?" Cagalli said now, dangerously. "That doesn't sound like a nobleman."_

_"You've got two choices here, Kevin," Murrue said now, frowning at him. "And they depend on who you are, and who you want to be." Her gaze sharpened, staring into his now surprised jade eyes. "If you're Onishi, then accept what's happening and move on; if you're Walker, then look at yourself in the mirror, and remember who you used to be! Well?" she demanded then. "Are you Onishi, or Walker? You can no longer be both!" _Her words rang through his mind._ "Are you Onishi or Walker... Are you Onishi or Walker... You can no longer be both... you can no longer be both..."_

He grabbed his cloak and the underlying shirt, and tore it off, heedless of the damage to the expensive -and delicate- garments. Now visible were the scars that covered his body, from so long ago...

"Kevin Onishi is dead," he snarled to the air. "Dead and gone! He couldn't take it; only Walker can..."

The bitter, angry youth ruthlessly tore away the garments that befitted his noble rank, and strode to a section of floor that appeared identical to the rest. Kneeling at it, he said clearly, _"Annon edhellen, edro hi ammen! Fennas nogothrim, lasto beth lammen!"_

The words were long forgotten by all but those few fascinated by fantasy from centuries past; even Cagalli would not have thought to use them. But this young man had a perfect memory, and used such Elvish words as passwords throughout the entire mansion (Murrue Ramius would not have been surprised; this was someone who kept his great-aunt in a marble statue, with a machine gun).

A section of wood floor silently opened, revealing a compartment he had not gazed into for two long years; and within lay a set of clothing that had, years ago, been the mark of a fearsome and dangerous man. Now the sandy-haired youth removed them from their hiding place, and began to draw them on.

Black trousers. Black t-shirt. Combat boots. Gunbelt (with Colt Single Action Army revolver and huge Bowie knife). Wrist sheath. Black leather jacket. Black gloves. And the final touch... a pair of sunglasses.

He slowly straightened, and carefully placed the shades over his eyes. Then he drew the Bowie knife, and gathered his long hair in one hand. "Kevin Onishi lies dead, forgotten by the long years since his passing," he murmured, as though in ritual. "All that remains... is the warrior." He sliced through, scattering hair all over the floor. "All that remains... is Kevin Walker!"

The feared super-soldier known as Kevin Walker then reached inwards with his mind, into long-dormant machinery... and reactivated his augmentation. In his glowing eyes, there was a bright green flash, like a mobile suit coming to life...

He gasped as his strength increased tenfold, his eyesight became much keener, his senses came alive with almost unbearable intensity. The ebb and flow of electromagnetic fields sang within, and the Destroyer was awakened once more.

It was exhilarating; like a paralyzed man walking once again, like a blind man regaining his sight. Kevin swore to himself than that never again would he shut down his augmentation; never again would he deprive himself of that feeling of power, of being _alive..._

Kevin smiled grimly, drew the thigh-holstered revolver, and twirled it around his finger. "The time has come to awaken from my long sleep, and wield these claws again..."

He was not being metaphorical. It was well known that within the Hydra's hands were concealed lethally-sharp metal claws, capable of slicing through almost anything known to man, including light mobile suit armor.

Or, more precisely, within his _left_ hand. His new right arm -constructed only six months before- omitted the claws entirely, in favor of the lethally-sharp sixty-centimeter blade he had once displayed to Shinn Asuka, as well as certain other nanotechnological features.

That, however, was a mere technicality. The simple fact was that, whatever the circumstances, Kevin Walker was himself again for the first time in two years, mind no longer conflicted by the need to maintain a persona that was no longer truly his own. No longer the politician, he was a soldier again... exactly what he was meant to be.

Behind him, the private study's door silently opened again, admitting Kira, Lacus, and Murrue. "It's good to see you again, Kevin," _Archangel_'s captain said, speaking first.

The remark earned her a confused look from the otherwise semi-revitalized super-soldier. "Thanks, but... I haven't exactly been anywhere, Murrue."

"Yes, you have," Lacus contradicted. "Baron Onishi's been here; _you_ haven't."

"She's right, Kevin," Kira agreed. "You know even better than we do that you haven't been yourself since you tried to put your past behind you. You just don't do very well with politics, you know?" He smiled, but also tilted his head questioningly. "So... what do you intend to do now? Are you going to try and convince Cagalli...?"

Kevin shook his head. "No," he said softly. "It wouldn't do any good; not when her mind is made up like this. Besides, I already tried, and look where _that_ got me." He sighed. "No, I'm going to transmit a Code Himmelkrieg message, then get myself back in top combat form... and leave."

Lacus' face fell, but she nodded in understanding; she knew her brother well, and his stubborn pride -and the troubled past that he'd never entirely put behind him- would not allow him to do anything else. He needed time to heal, and he couldn't do that in a place full of so many childhood memories. "I understand, Kevin. But... you'll keep in touch, won't you?"

Kevin nodded, a trace of his old ready grin -which might soon be a common sight again- appearing. "Of course, Sis. I'm leaving Orb, but I'm not about to _completely_ isolate myself. Besides, I'll need to keep in touch in order to know if and when my father returns."

Murrue nodded, smiling. "We'll let you know. And remember, Kevin, _we_, at least, will be here. If you need help..."

"I know."

Kevin's sisters, blood and by oath, might've understood what was going on, but Kira didn't, and he frowned in confusion. "Wait a minute. What's 'Code Himmelkrieg'? And how are you going to leave Orb? I mean, _Amaterasu _isn't even repaired yet, and-"

"_Dominion_ still exists, Kira," Kevin said simply. "Like I said before, I've done a lot of work in the past two years. The first thing I did was ransack the GARM facility at Mendel, then begin to set up a Base of Operations at the old Artemis fortress. Took a few months to get the place back in shape, but by now it's once again a fully-functional base, with _Dominion_ fully repaired and waiting for reactivation, along with two new ships under construction, a number of mobile suits, a trans-atmospheric cargo ship -the _Concepcion-_ and quite a few special research projects, including one into how to stop Snake Eater from killing me."

Kira blinked. "How did you pull all _that_ off with nobody even _noticing?"_

The super-soldier smiled. "Simple: one of the first things we did was design and build a scaled-up hyper jammer system. The entire base is invisible, and kept that way by a bank of fusion reactors... which would also serve to power a fully-repaired light-wave barrier, should it ever become necessary to defend the base against attack."

His friend stared at him. "You've spent two years of peace preparing for the next _war?"_ he said, almost unable to believe it... but only almost. "Do you have any idea what would've happened if that had become public, Kevin? You're -okay, you _were_- an Orb baron; the Earth Alliance would've-"

"I would've taken the flak, and Orb wouldn't have suffered any consequences," Kevin replied calmly. "All things considered, particularly given that the funding came from my own fortune, it would've been no worse than the Heliopolis incident two years ago. It was a chance I was willing to take, because I knew -as did Lacus, Andy, and Murrue, incidentally- that the war wasn't over. Both sides arrived at a peace treaty last year more out of mutual exhaustion and transitory horror over the extreme measures taken at Jachin Due than over a real resolution of their differences."

Kira turned to Lacus, seeking confirmation, and she shrugged. "I can't say I agreed with Kevin's reasoning completely," she said, "though he appears to have been proven correct after all. At the time, however, I saw it more as a contingency measure than anything else... and there was another element, as well."

Murrue nodded agreement. "All-out war wasn't the only scenario we considered, Kira. In fact, it wasn't quite the most likely, in our estimation. Rather, there's the small problem that just about every nation and organization on Earth and in the colonies has at least _some_ problem with Kevin Walker, Blue Cosmos and the Earth Alliance in particular. We judged that it wasn't at all unlikely that, in the event Kevin was exposed as the Crimson Tiger, one or both sides might make an attempt to deal with the problem once and for all."

Kira started to respond to that, then frowned. _They've got a point there,_ he admitted unwillingly. _Some people think Kevin's a hero for destroying GENESIS, but a lot of other people, especially on Earth, mostly remember the body counts he keep creating._

At last, he just sighed. "So you're not even gonna try to stop Cagalli, huh?"

"It would be a mistake," Kevin said, outwardly calm; but the emotions Kira felt over their link told a rather different tale. "There's still a slim chance she'll come to her senses on her own, I suppose, at which point there might be a chance for _us..._ but if I tried to interfere, it would only make things worse. No, Kira, I'm afraid the best thing for me to do is leave this place, and begin the hunt for my father. He has to be stopped, before whatever mad plan he has in mind can come to fruition."

Kira shook his head. "Maybe you're making a mistake by _not_ trying to stop it, Kevin."

"It's possible," the sandy-haired soldier conceded. "But I don't think so... and either way, well, you what they say: all the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. I have my own part to play, and that's on the field of battle, not behind a conference table." He shrugged. "In any case, Kira, I'm not going to be leaving immediately. I'm afraid my body isn't in the shape it used to be, and I'm going to have to fix that before I can be truly considered combat ready. Moreover, it's going to take at least a few days to reassemble _Dominion_'s crew, given the way they all scattered after the war. Meryl, of course, is here with us, and Max will be taking Flay's place at Communications, but the rest... I don't even have the faintest idea where Natarle and John ended up, you know?"

Kira blinked. "You don't know either? I thought..."

Kevin laughed. "Kira, remember who and what John is: he's a clone of me, and despite the inevitable differences between us, he retains my liking for secrecy. As he seems to have rubbed off on Natarle, the combination is... interesting, and leaves me with no clue where my exec and fire control officer are. I know they'll respond to the summons -John, to my knowledge, never deactivated _his_ augmentation, so his radio implant will still be live- but until then..."

The brown-haired Coordinator managed a chuckle of his own, but Lacus looked at her brother with some concern in her eyes. "You're still intent on doing it this way, then?" she said softly. "You refuse to let justice take its course... so you'll kill him yourself?"

"I told you before, I don't trust the justice system," Kevin told her. "And I'm an assassin, not a policeman. I committed fratricide two years ago; I'm not exactly concerned by the prospect of patricide. Not after he murdered Frank, and set out to end _my_ life, as well." He shook his head. "No, Lacus. I'm sorry, but your uncle's life was forfeit from the moment he set out on this path. The courts could never touch him... but I can, and I will." He shrugged, and turned toward the study's door. "Right now, though, I have work to do. It's not going to be a simple matter to re-accustom myself -or my body- to fully-active augmentation."

He left then, moving with the almost liquid grace of someone whose reaction time and neural conduction velocity were far higher than normal, and Lacus shook her head. "I still can't agree with what he's doing... but it's good to see him back to normal. And he seems to be recovering from Cagalli's decision much faster than I'd feared."

"No, he isn't," Kira contradicted.

Murrue glanced at him. "What do you mean? He seemed almost fine by the time he left..."

He shook his head. "You saw what he wanted you to see, Murrue. Look, he and I roomed together at Heliopolis, remember? And we went through a lot together on the _Archangel,_ before we ever reached Earth. He's good at hiding what he's feeling; good enough that he really can shove it out of his own mind for hours, even days at a time. But it's still there, underneath it all. It'll take more than just resolving his identity crisis to really bring him back to normal."

"And what will that take?" Lacus asked quietly. She'd known Kevin better than Kira did, once, but Kira had known the super-soldier Kevin had become rather longer.

Kira shrugged. "If I know him, it'll take either a lot of time, Cagalli coming to her senses... or Kevin being on the battlefield. He always did find that a great way to relieve stress."

"It's what he was created to be," Murrue pointed out. "A soldier, I mean. First his father, then ZAFT..."

"It's a person's choices, not his genes that determine what he's truly meant for," Lacus disputed. "Kevin would be the first to say that."

"He'd also be the first to say that all his choices have led to this point," Kira reminded her. "And all his experiences. No one really knows what happened during the two years he was on the run, remember. _Something_ certainly shaped him into what he is today, and it wasn't just the modifications made to his body."

Given the fact that Kevin Walker was known to have personally killed over three hundred people before ever becoming involved in the Earth/ZAFT War, there wasn't really much more to be said after that. For once, it was the dead men who told the tales...

* * *

In a Morgenroete observation room, overlooking the ZAFT warship _Minerva,_ Arthur Trine frowned discontentedly. "I don't like this," he said, voice low. "The way Orb's government is starting to lean toward... I still think we should leave as soon as possible, Captain."

Talia Gladys sighed. "I understand your feelings, Arthur; and I'm as up to date on the information Miss Walker has been giving us as you are. Despite the political situation here, however, I believe it would be more destabilizing if we were to leave. Leaving aside the simple logistics -and remember, we _do_ need to resupply- there's the matter of Carpentaria. The Earth Alliance has sent a fleet in that direction, but they're holding position for now; if we move out too quickly, it might lead them act rashly."

"I know, but..."

She stifled another sigh. "Arthur, Operation Twilight Spear will be launched soon; after that, we should be able to leave without a problem. Until then, however, we have little choice but to stay put." She smiled then. "And I, for one, don't believe we'll be in much danger as long as we're here. Baron Onishi is a... formidable individual; while he may not speak for the entire Orb government, he most certainly has enough influence to prevent his colleagues from summarily expelling us."

"Hm..." Trine was still unconvinced, but he let the matter drop. He knew his captain well enough to recognize when she simply wouldn't be moved by his arguments.

Nearby, checklist in hand and gaze ostensibly on the _Minerva_ herself, Alec King nodded thoughtfully to himself. _You're right about that, Captain,_ he granted, almost unwillingly. _Except for that incident five years ago, Kevin has always kept his word... and if I know him, he'll fight to uphold it, even if it means protecting ZAFT forces._

That was a fight that would be even more effective than either of his superiors realized, of course. They couldn't know what Basilisk did, couldn't feel the distinctive signature that had recently flared to life at the extreme edge of his implant sensors' range. The signature of a Destroyer with implants fully active...

* * *

Morning found Athrun heading to the door of his hotel suite, preparing for a trip about the PLANT; he was no closer to a decision on the chance Durandal had offered him...but as long as he was going to be here anyway, there were some things he felt he needed to do.

He did not, however, get what he expected when he opened the door.

One moment Athrun was opening the door; the next, a hand had grabbed his collar, and hoisted him centimeters into the air. "Just what's going on here, Athrun?" Yzak Joule demanded, shoving Athrun back into the room, while Dearka Elsman entered behind him. "We were busy on battlefield duties, cleaning up the mess from that attack -and looking for any trace of someone who helped us out then- and then we got pulled off the assignment to play escort service!"

"Hello to you too, Yzak," Athrun managed, catching his breath. "Sorry to disappoint you, though; I don't know what's going on, either. This is the first I've heard of it."

"I think the Chairman thinks it's too dangerous for you to roam around by yourself right now," Dearka offered. "Though whether he's worried about people thinking a foreign citizen is spying or that you might be in danger, I don't know."

Athrun shrugged. "I don't know, either. I mean, I did know I was going to have an escort, but I had no idea it would be you two."

_If Snake had anything to do with this,_ Yzak groused inwardly, _I'll kill him._ He wouldn't put it past the Baron, either; he had influence, and contacts, just about everywhere... _But I guess that doesn't really matter right now, does it?_ "...Well, whatever," he said aloud. "Let's just get going." He shot Athrun a glare. "And if you say you want to go shopping, Athrun, I swear I'll never forgive you."

He was actually kind of expecting an amused reaction from his former teammate, but the response he actually got was completely serious. "No, Yzak," Athrun said softly. "I... I haven't had the chance to be in the PLANTs much lately... so I thought that, while I had the chance, I'd visit the cemetery. The one with Nicol, Miguel, and Rusty's graves..."

Dearka nodded somberly, and even Yzak's hostility eased. "Yeah," he said quietly. "Maybe that _is_ a good idea..."

He no longer bore anyone any hatred for those deaths. He'd gotten to know Kira Yamato fairly well during the last month of the previous war, and respected him; had even forgiven him for the scar that had once marked him. Nor did Yzak bear any ill will toward the man who had killed Nicol, for he knew ZAFT had done far more terrible things to Kevin himself... and because he respected the super-soldier, both as a person and as a warrior.

No, there was no more hatred. Only sadness... and so Yzak and Dearka both understood Athrun's desire to pay his respects to their fallen comrades.

* * *

Andrew Waltfeld watched as the news report wound down, frowning. _So it's come down to it, has it,_ he thought, feeling a mixture of concern and resignation. _They're going to sign that treaty, and ride it all the way into history... Well, I'd better tell the kid he needs to warn his friends on _Minerva_, and soon._

At that moment, said "kid" -looking much better than he had the day before, but still somber- stepped into the mansion's large "living room". He was absently twirling a revolver, and his jade eyes were intent behind the shades; from his manner, Andy figured he was probably plotting Yuna Seiran's assassination. _And if he thought for a minute he could get away with it, he would..._

But that wasn't the subject that needed to be addressed now. "Hey, Racher," he called, "there's news... bad news."

Kevin Walker paused, dropped the Colt back into its holster, and turned to his mentor. "What's up, Andy? And why do I not like the sound of that?"

"Well, it's not exactly surprising," Andy admitted, "but I figure you might like to know that the treaty is all but signed. The Prime Minister's been talking about it again, and the newsies don't think there's going to be any real opposition from the Chief Representative."

Kevin growled low in his throat; a sound more tiger than man. "It figures," he said, after uttering a Russian expletive. "That slimy bastard... and she's going along with it, not even trying to stop it..."

"In all fairness to Cagalli," Murrue put in, entering from a side door, "it's not like she has much of a choice. I know you prefer to just go your own way, Kevin, but you've spent enough time in Orb politics to know that she doesn't operate in a vacuum. Even the Chief Representative's preferences can be overridden, if enough of the government is against her... and from what I hear, just about the _entire_ government if pro-treaty at this point."

"This wouldn't have happened if the Earth Forces hadn't attacked two years ago," Kevin muttered, more to himself than in reply to her statement. "If they hadn't created a situation where Orb's previous -and sane- government felt they were honor-bound to take responsibility and blow themselves up..."

"All this angst is interesting and all, Racher," Andy drawled, "but that's not exactly why I brought this up. You_ do_ know what'll happen if the treaty is signed while _Minerva_ is still in port here, don't you?"

"Solkin syn," the super-soldier uttered, closing his eyes for a moment in thought. "I hadn't thought of that, and I should have. It _would_ be just like the Seirans to betray Talia and the others, even after their efforts to stop Junius Seven from falling..." He paused, bringing up his schedule from his implant database. "...I should have time to drop by Morgenroete, if I hurry; can't take too long, though. Leona's leaving for space today, as soon as she can tender her resignation."

"Are you sure that's wise?" Murrue questioned. "Athrun's already gone to the PLANTs, you're preparing to leave yourself... shouldn't you leave _someone_ with Cagalli?"

Kevin shook his head. "Pointless. I know Yuna, Murrue, far better than I want to; he'll dismiss Leona as soon as he can anyway, simply because of her connections to me. Better to get it over with now, so that Leona can get a head start on the augmentation surgery. You _don't_ recover from that overnight." He sighed. "Well, I guess I'll be going, then... and hope that Shinn Asuka doesn't pitch a fit when he sees Kevin Walker instead of Baron Onishi."

"And if he does?" Andy wondered.

The super-soldier shrugged. "I'll do nothing for now; at least, nothing unnecessary. I'm not scared of him, if that's what you mean. On the ground, I doubt he has much skill at all. After all, he's a pilot, not a grunt. In the air... well, I have my ways. Either way, I'm not expecting any trouble today. A shouting match, perhaps, but I'll at least grant that Shinn isn't a _total_ idiot."

Murrue smiled. "Well, good luck."

He tossed off a cocky wave, turned, and left... and as he went, her smile faded.

"Still a little worried about him, aren't you," Andy noted.

"I'm not exactly sanguine about some of the things he's done," Murrue admitted. "Oh, I'm not afraid of what he'll do to _other_ people; his methods can be a little... extreme sometimes, but he always has a reason, and generally he's right. But... he has no fear of death, you know. None at all."

"And that can lead to him taking chances he wouldn't otherwise," he agreed, nodding. "Well, it's hard to blame him; he even incinerated himself once, and he came back. Why should someone like that worry about death?"

"Because I'm convinced there's some kind of scientific explanation for his revival," she replied. "And if that's true, his more recent experiments could kill even him, if something goes wrong. Remember: only two prototypes_ haven't_ blown up the instant they were activated."

Andy shook his head. "You're worrying too much, Murrue. Look: the reaction mass Nemesis uses _does_ have the potential to blow up an entire city, yeah... but do you think he'd have let it anywhere _near_ Cagalli if he wasn't absolutely certain he'd gotten all the bugs out?"

Murrue started to reply, then paused. _Put that way... Even if he were entirely prepared to forget about Cagalli, which he most certainly isn't, he conducted those experiments _before_ any of this occurred..._

"I guess you've got a point, at that," she admitted. "Still... I can't help worrying that one day he might sacrifice himself again... and stay that way."

* * *

Three simple, ordinary grave markers. That's all they were; and no bodies lay beneath them, for they had been destroyed in the fury of battle... but those simple markers were enough. To those who knew to look for them, they memorialized three brave souls who had died for the cause of liberating the PLANTs... three brothers in arms... three friends.

The trio of visitors who had come to see their fallen comrades lay wreaths over the empty graves, then lifted their right hands in unison to salute them. There were no words; words did not suffice for this... but they weren't needed, anyway.

"I wish they could be here to see that their sacrifices weren't in vain," Athrun said at last, voice quiet. "We did it... and we couldn't have done it without them."

"Yeah," Dearka agreed. Once, he might've thought Athrun too soft; now, he'd mellowed some himself, in large part due to his time serving with Kira Yamato, as well as Miriallia Haw. "Listen, Athrun... we're about to make our move. ZAFT is launching Operation Twilight Spear, to reinforce Carpentaria. Soon, that base will be safe again. But..." He shrugged. "I don't know about you, but I don't think that one defeat, or even what we did to them with the Neutron Stampeder, will stop the Earth Alliance from trying to exterminate us. This war isn't over yet, not by a longshot."

"He's right," Yzak affirmed. "...We're going to need all the people we can get, Athrun, and that's why I'm going to say something I never thought I would. I think you should come back to ZAFT. I'll even help arrange things for you." He glanced away. "Look... you know we were all granted amnesty at the end of the war, by Chairman Canaver, right?"

"Well, yeah," Athrun acknowledged, puzzled by the apparent non sequitur. "Of course. What about it?"

"Several members of the new Supreme Council weren't very happy about it," the silver-haired pilot informed him. "Partly because they felt we really did deserve execution -for that shuttle when we destroyed the Eighth Fleet, and for joining the Four Ships Alliance near the end of the war- and partly because Snake was a big part of how the amnesty was arranged in the first place. I didn't find out until the Council started talking about it, but apparently he was kind of... firm with the Provisional Supreme Council on the matter, and used all the clout he had as an Orb Baron to make it stick. Well, several of the newer representatives resented that... and they tried to get the amnesty revoked."

Athrun blinked. "They actually tried that? But that's... They couldn't have gotten away with that!"

"They might've," Dearka disagreed. "It wouldn't have been pretty, but they might've managed it. But Chairman Durandal decided to step in, before the proceedings got anywhere, and told them that it would be stupid, and morally wrong, to execute soldiers who fought so hard for the sole purpose of bringing the war to an end. He also pointed out that we were driven to desertion by the actions of a government that had gone too far in the pursuit of its goals."

"He also said that we were the ones who carried 'the future of the PLANTs', whatever that means," Yzak concurred. "And that pretty well stopped the whole thing. So we're still with ZAFT to this day... because it's the only way we can continue to protect the PLANTs... to carry on the work _they_ died for." He nodded at the graves. "You understand what we're saying, Athrun?"

"...Yeah..."

Athrun gazed down at the silent markers. _The power to make a difference... that's why I joined ZAFT in the first place. Or, no, it was originally for revenge, for my mother's death -guess Kevin and I weren't so different back then after all- but by the end... If I'd only cared about vengeance, I never would've left. Now, I have the chance to go back to the ZAFT I thought I knew, to the one that _is_ that again._

_If I can make a difference...  
_

* * *

"So, the treaty will be going through, then?" Unato Ema Seiran asked his son.

"Yes, Father," Yuna replied, with a nod and a smile. "There's a few details yet to be worked out, but nothing significant... and I believe I can put Cagalli in her place easily enough." He frowned then. "That does, unfortunately, leave Onishi to worry about..."

Unato snorted. "He's not going to be a problem. He's leaving Orb completely, from what I've heard, and maybe even taking that Walker girl with him. And even if she stays, she's nothing but a spokesperson, without the full force of his personality to drive the issue."

"True, Father." The younger Seiran smiled again. "And, ironically, Onishi himself _is_ making this somewhat easier. Cagalli's effectively destroyed their relationship... but she still cares enough for him that the prospect of his departure is making her even more uncertain of herself, more confused, and so easier to manipulate. Though there _is_still his threat to fight us... You know as well as I what lies beneath Onishi Mansion."

Unato shook his head. "Unless he's willing to launch a nuclear ICBM at us -which he doesn't even have the capability to do, unless he's been buying black market N-jammer cancelers- there's nothing he can do to us as long as we don't make the mistake of trying anything against him. No, Yuna, as long as we ignore him, Onishi is no longer a factor in our plans. His father could certainly have caused us difficulties -I always suspected he had some kind of scheme in mind- but the son is no more than a pup... or maybe I should say cub."

Yuna smiled widely. "So everything is going according to plan..."

* * *

Arthur Trine's expression was... odd, to say the least, when he stepped into Talia Gladys' office aboard the_ Minerva._ It looked to her that whatever message he bore was one that confused him mightily... which, perhaps, wasn't entirely surprising. He was an excellent executive officer, but his imagination wasn't the widest in the world.

"There's someone here to see you, Captain," he said now, still looking puzzled. "It's Baron Onishi... I think."

Talia titled her head. "You _think?_ I wouldn't have thought there'd be much doubt; the Baron is a rather distinctive individual, after all."

"Well, yes, Ma'am, but he didn't actually introduce himself. He just turned up outside, and said he needed to see you. He's... not in formal government clothing, either; he's in civilian clothes."

She frowned. "What is he up to...? Well, let him in, please. Whatever it is that brought him here must be important; he's not the type to do something like this for no reason at all." _In fact, it's pretty strange even for him; I've heard he likes to be cryptic, but..._

The hatch slid open again a few moments later, and the sandy-haired youth stepped in, clad all in black, sunglasses over his eyes, and a revolver at his thigh. Talia wondered for an instant how he could've gotten in there so visibly armed... until she realized there was something odd about his movements, and she knew exactly why. _If he's reactivated his cybernetics, then he could trick _Minerva_'s computers into letting _anything_ past... and I doubt the ZAFT soldier's been born who's willing to get in _his_ way when he looks like that._

She cleared her throat. "Well, this is a surprise. May I ask what brings you here, Baron?"

"First off, you've got the wrong guy," Kevin said easily, leaning against the bulkhead beside the hatch. "Baron Onishi's on indefinite vacation; the name's Kevin Walker."

Talia inhaled sharply. She didn't know him nearly as well as some did, but she knew enough to realize the significance of _that_ distinction. "I... see..." she managed after a moment. "I'll bear that in mind... so, what can I do for you, B- Captain Walker?" She settled on that form of address -since he obviously didn't want to hear "Baron"- based on the captain's bars on the collar of his leather jacket; exactly what they signified, though, she had no idea.

"I've got a message for you, actually," he replied. "From me, in part... but it originates from the Desert Tiger."

She stiffened. The Desert Tiger hadn't been heard from since the end of the first war... but it was well known that the _Crimson_ Tiger had once been his protege. If they _both_ spoke -however it was that Andrew Waltfeld had gotten involved- it must be something important. "What kind of message, Captain?"

"To clear out of here," Kevin said bluntly, "as soon as ZAFT drops their forces around Carpentaria and Gibraltar."

"How do you know about-"

"That's not your concern, Talia," he interrupted. "I have my sources; leave it at that. The important thing is, you need to get out of here as soon as you can. I'm currently on... less than cordial terms with the rest of the government, but I happen to know that they intend to sign the treaty very soon; perhaps within hours. When that treaty is signed, Orb will become a member of the Earth Alliance, and you will be a shipfull of enemy soldiers within their territory. Do you really want to be here when that happens?"

Talia shook her head. "No, I don't suppose we do... Thank you, Captain. Given your... position, I have no choice but to accept that your information is genuine." _Besides which,_ she added silently, _everyone knows Kevin Walker has no need to lie; if he wants something done, he'll just do it himself. Better living through superior firepower, I suppose..._ "In that case, we'll be leaving tomorrow; Morgenroete has done a phenomenal repair job."

"They better have; most of the repairs were done out of my own pocket." Kevin absently rubbed the scar bisecting his face. "At any rate, I'd say that's a good idea. Frankly, I don't trust the Seirans not to pull something while they have the chance. And even if they don't... Well, it's a nasty world out there, Talia. I don't know how much involvement you had in the last war, but let me tell you: war is _not_ pretty. The _Archangel_ survived through luck, a strategically-minded mobile armor pilot, and the offices of the Strike pilot; without that, not even we would've made it." He lowered his voice. "And since I know that, and because I happen to be of the opinion that the PLANTs are in the right in this war, I'm going to be sending along a couple of my agents in a few days."

"Agents?" Trine repeated, speaking for the first time. "What kind of agents?"

"Nothing to do with espionage, if that's what you're worried about," Kevin said dryly. "As you're no doubt aware, I could've gotten any information I wanted simply by walking through the ship's corridors, were that my aim. No, I'm just intending to send a... liaison mission. A single ship, and her accompanying mobile suits. There's nothing to connect them to Orb, or to anywhere else, for that matter, so you shouldn't have trouble with the higher-ups."

"I appreciate it, Captain," Talia said sincerely. "I can't imagine where you're getting the forces -and I expect I shouldn't know until we're safely out of the country- but if you're willing to lend some aid to ZAFT, we're grateful... especially considering, in the old days, you were more known for _attacking_ ZAFT forces."

"That was another time, Talia," he said quietly. "Another time, and another war. At that time, there were still people with heavy involvement in the planning and execution of the ABADDON Project within ZAFT; and I was but little removed from a period when almost everyone in the world was out to kill me. Now, I've humbled Blue Cosmos -some- and those in ZAFT who were responsible for what I became are dead... and time can soften even my wounds. I may never like ZAFT, but nor do I hate them now."

She watched his eyes closely, but there was no trace of deception in them as he spoke. Admittedly, that didn't mean much all by itself -the training all the Destroyers had been given meant they could claim the moon really _was_ made of cheese, and people would think they believed it- but she felt that he was, indeed, telling the truth. _Interesting. I never would've thought the Black Asp could've mellowed that way..._

"I see," she said at last. "And again, thank you. Just as in the last war, we have the advantage in technology, but we also have the same disadvantage in numbers. That help will be greatly appreciated."

"I thought it might be." Kevin's hand moved up in a brief salute -more out of courtesy than anything else- and then he turned for the hatch. "See you around, Talia... and may we never step onto the battlefield as enemies."

* * *

Walking through the _Minerva_'s corridors once again, this time on his way out, Kevin was not at all surprised when he sensed a familiar presence, and rounded a corner to see Shinn Asuka leaning against a bulkhead, glaring at him. "I suppose you've got something to say, kid?" the super-soldier said dryly, pausing.

"Just a warning, Walker," Shinn replied, eyes hard. "I know your worthless nation is about to sign that treaty; just goes to show you how cowardly the Athha family really is. But if they're going to do that, that makes us your enemies... and if we ever meet on the battlefield, don't expect me to hold back."

Kevin rested his hand lightly on the grips of his revolver. "I hope I'm not supposed to be impressed, Asuka," he said softly. "First of all, I just got done warning your captain to clear out... and offering my assistance after the ship leaves Orb. See, I'm not an Orb baron anymore; that was a farce, and I've finally given it up. What I am is a solider, who's spent the majority of his life from the age of thirteen onwards on the battlefield, and accumulated more combat experience along the way than your entire crew combined. I survived battling Rau Le Creuset, kid; I'm not worried about _you."_ He turned, resumed walking, and then added over his shoulder, "Death awaits the overconfident. Remember that."

A few steps more, and he was to _Minerva_'s hatch... and beyond it, he sensed someone else. The person he wanted to see even less than Shinn Asuka right now... and yet wanted to see more than anyone. _But our paths have split; there's nothing more for me here._

Outside, as Cagalli neared the hatch, she paused in surprise at the sight of it opening, allowing a certain sandy-haired youth in black to exit. She wanted to say something... but he didn't even look at her. Instead, he continued walking... and abruptly blurred, then vanished into thin air, as though he'd never been there at all...

* * *

Shaking off the uncanny sight -more comprehensible when it occurred to her that Kevin might've been carrying optic camouflage gear- Cagalli continued toward the _Minerva. _Yuna Roma Seiran had just personally told her that the decision had been made; Orb was going to sign the treaty allying itself with the Earth Alliance, in order to avoid a repetition of the events of two years before.

She hated it, but there was little she could do... and it was her responsibility to tell these brave soldiers, and apologize. _I can't believe we're actually taking this course... but in a way, that Asuka guy was right. All staying out of it now will do is get us scorched tomorrow... just like when my father died..._

It was, perhaps, inevitable that the first person she should run into when she stepped aboard the ship was Shinn Asuka himself. Rey Za Burrel and Lunamaria Hawke were also with him, but he was the one who clearly intended to speak... as, perhaps, she might've expected.

"So you're here," he said flatly. "Just like Walker."

"Is there something you want to say, Asuka?" Cagalli asked, as politely as she could manage.

"Just this: I told Walker, and I'm telling you, that if Orb is my enemy now, I won't hesitate to destroy you." He shook his head. "How you can ally yourselves with the people who attacked your country before, I just don't know..."

Shinn walked past then... and carefully arranged for his shoulder to bump hers aside as he went, giving another not-so-subtle sign of his opinion of the matter. His two companions met Cagalli's eyes apologetically... but walked after him, almost as though they agreed with him.

_Which they probably do,_ Cagalli thought sadly. _Why does everything have to happen like this...?_

She didn't know. It seemed that the Fate Kevin so often spoke of was taking a cruel turn... and there was nothing she could do about it at all.

Fortunately for her sanity, though, Talia Gladys herself was the next person she encountered. The captain was clearly surprised, but not belligerent the way Shinn had been. "Lady Cagalli? I wouldn't have expected to see you here; although since Captain Walker just left, I suppose it's not as surprising as it might be."

Cagalli shrugged. "I... came to apologize, Captain. I know you'll be leaving fairly soon, and I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for the way Orb is treating you. This isn't what you deserve; you and your people are the only reason Orb wasn't destroyed when Junius Seven fell. With all that, you should've been welcomed as heroes, not treated with suspicion."

Talia shook her head. "It's not your fault, My Lady. I know you didn't want this, either; and I also understand why people might be resentful of us right now. It's unfortunate, but we all know it can't be helped... so the best thing for us to do is just leave the area, and get back to our own territory. Perhaps, one day..."

"Yes," Cagalli agreed. "Someday, you'll be remembered for what you did, not what other people thought of you. And until then... Well, thank you for understanding."

"Captain Walker already explained the situation to us, Lady Cagalli. Believe me, we _do_ understand." Talia held out her hand. "Perhaps we'll meet again someday, My Lady."

"I hope so, Captain. Under better circumstances." _If there ever _are_ better circumstances,_ she added to herself. Cagalli shook the captain's hand, then turned, and left. She'd done all she could; the only person who might do more was Kevin...

* * *

High up above, Athrun Zala lifted a phone, and punched in a number. He'd made his decision at last; though he knew some he knew -like Kevin- might disapprove, he believed he'd made the right choice... the _only_ choice he could.

_It's sit this war out,_ he thought, _and never forgive myself... or fight to make a difference, and be able to look at myself in the mirror again._

When a voice answered the call, he brought his mind back to the present. "Yes, this is Athrun Zala," he said, identifying himself. "I'd like to meet with Chairman Durandal as soon as possible, please."

Yes, his choice was made... now he had to play his own part, as Kevin himself might expect.

* * *

Author's note: ZAFT now prepares to defend its Earthbound bases, as the flames of a new war begin to rise. At the same time, Athrun Zala makes his own decision as to where he belongs in the war... and far below, a sleeping tiger awakens at last. What does Fate hold in store for this wounded soldier?

Well, I do believe I got this one finished reasonably quickly for a change; hopefully, I'll continue that trend in the future. At any rate, I expect there wasn't much in the way of surprises in this chapter, but I think it was interesting nonetheless. Well, let me know what you think, so I can get Chapter 12 going, eh? -Solid Shark


	12. Chapter 12: The Nemesis Revealed

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

_"War is full of senseless tragedies; that's the world we live in, whether we like it or not. Actually, the whole world is full of pointless death, whether it be in war or not... but war does seem to bring them about even more than anything else._

_"What's worse, in my case, is that my very existence seems to attract violence. Maybe that's inevitable, considering the life I lead, but all too often innocents are caught in the crossfire. Unfortunately, Joseph Stalin wasn't completely wrong when he said, 'One death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic.' That's overly simplistic, of course, and the sense _he_ meant was morally bankrupt, but there _is_ a kernel of truth in it. After you've seen as much death as I have, taken as many lives... death is something you get used to. The more you see it, the easier it is to bear... and the more you kill, the easier it is to kill._

_"Yet even for me, there are some who stand out... some deaths which I cannot be allowed to forget. My late, lamented comrades at ABADDON... Nicol Amalfi... and three other people. A family, whose deaths I did not realize I had any part in until recently. But because of them, I have a new, implacable foe._

_"I've had my share of enemies in the past; more than my share, really. Most of them are dead; and most of them became my enemies by actions or prejudices of their own. Another, Dearka Elsman, had hated me ever since I tossed him through a wall; but when he found out why I'd done it, he got over it, and we became good friends._

_"But this one... he is my enemy because of something _I_ did, however unwittingly, in the heat of battle. Most of a family, killed by means of a shot that somehow failed to find its mark... a shot I cannot recall firing, but know that I did, for no one else _could_ have fired it._

_"And because of that, Shinn Asuka, though his skills are lacking compared to some I know, has become, in some ways, my most implacable foe. He fights for the same reason I have, more than once. He fights to avenge his family uncaring that I had never known I'd done it, and so he has become my enemy. My... nemesis..."_

Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Baron Kevin Onishi

* * *

_The battle for JOSHUA was still raging._

_The beleaguered Earth Forces were still mounting a desperate defense despite their staggering casualties in the opening minutes of the battle and through it all. Leona watched it all with a cool façade which hid all of the tension and stress that was just simmering under the surface, although it was slowly bleeding out as the battle was clearly in their favor despite the presence of the legendary 'legged ship'._

_"__Her captain has to know that they can't win this fight," Leona said to herself out loud. She had maneuvered her CGUE on top of a ZAFT submarine carrier to re-arm after they, her and the rest of the NGSF, had broken through the outer defense perimeter of JOSHUA with no casualties at all._

_Leona and a few other NGSF members had opted to stay behind and help the remaining of the ZAFT invasion forces clear the outside for reinforcement, while the rest went into to help break the inner gates._

_The commander of the NGSF just sat in her open cockpit, patiently waiting for the crew to finish re-arming her mobile suit, unmindful of the explosions overhead. That is, until an azure beam destroyed two submarine carriers and about a dozen mobile suits that were adjacent to them up front. _

_She nearly jumped in surprise at what had transpired in front of her. She looked around for the shooter and saw an unknown mobile with wings spread dealing death to any nearby ZAFT forces. Despite the threat of instant of death, Leona calmly contacted the head mechanic overseeing and asked them to speed up her re-armament. The supply crew was more than happy to comply._

_Still, by the time Leona was able to take off, the unknown mobile had vanished inside the _Archangel_ through a hole in the ship's starboard flight deck. Leona had just ordered the few NGSF fighting outside to engage the Archangel when she received a message from her second in command that they had taken the main gate with minimal casualties._

_Leona then noticed that the _Archangel_ took some missile fire and was going down; but the ship's retaliatory fire -courtesy of its Lohengrins- took out two of her people, in a pair of DINNS, as they were preparing to re-supply._

_"__You're going down." Leona said as she moved towards the legged ship, but a GINN riding a GUUL beat her to it and was about to blow the Archangel's bridge to kingdom come when the ZGMF-X10A Freedom finally made its presence known._

Another one?_ she thought in disbelief. Yet another unknown mobile suit had arrived to save the Archangel as she made her CGUE strafe around some weapons fire from a nearby EA ship. After taking care of the unwanted distraction, Leona's mobile suit was hit hard when the unknown mobile suit unleashed its own weaponry against the ZAFT forces._

_"__Not good," Leona said calmly as her suit's right arm was destroyed, anything below the suit's shoulder was gone._

_Seconds later, Leona heard the pilot of the unknown mobile suit make an announcement of there being a Cyclops system inside JOSHUA, and it was ready to activate at any moment. Her heart froze, and she raced to the base, ignoring the subsequent fight that happened between the Freedom and the Duel, all the while ordering her teammates to evacuate who were confused at the sudden order and the strange behavior of the commander._

_All of a sudden her sensors picked up a HUGE spike in radiation, and then she heard the screams of her teammates as they were consumed in a radioactive fire, and Leona's world abruptly turned white…  
_

* * *

Morning was coming... and it would be a red-soaked dawn that greeted those waking from their rest. Operation Spear of Twilight had been launched, and fighting raged around Carpentaria in Australia and Gibraltar in Europe. And soon, more blood would be spilled as a nation betrayed those who had helped it.

Kevin Walker was not among those only just waking; he had not slept that night, for he had preparations to make... because he knew only too well what his "colleagues" in the Seiran family were likely to try. So he'd spent the night training himself, working hard to get back into battle-ready shape... and planning exactly how he was going to help spoil Yuna Roma Seiran's fun.

Unsurprisingly, Andy, Murrue, Kira, and Lacus were in the living room when he arrived. "I see you're all awake," Kevin noted. "Anything going on?"

_"Minerva_ is launching even now," Murrue replied. "There's still no sign of any opposition, but... Well, I doubt the Earth Alliance would pass up a chance like this."

He nodded sharply. "Then it's time. Murrue, Andy, we'd better get moving; I'll need a little help down there, and with Leona on her way to space, Max taking care of official business at Morgenroete, and Meryl taking care of the_ un_official business there..."

Andy nodded. "Right. Let's go, Racher."

The three of them headed for one of the walls, and Kira glanced around in confusion. "Wait a minute. Go where? What are you talking about?"

Kevin flicked a command into the mansion's systems through his neural linkages, and one oak panel slid aside to reveal an elevator. "This entire building is actually something of a facade, Kira. Not long after the Reconstruction War, my family -the Onishi family- located on this island an abandoned base from the war, and chose to place their home over it. The base, you see, is huge; extends down into the bedrock beneath the island, and a little ways out under the ocean. There's a _lot_ of abandoned weapons and material down there, including small arms, anti-aircraft and anti-armor weapons, ground vehicles, aircraft, and even a fully-functional mass driver. There are also numerous additions the family has made over the years... including something of my own, just recently arrived." He lifted an eyebrow. "You coming?"

With a wordless nod, Kira and Lacus followed the other three into the elevator, which promptly began to descend, carrying them deep into the cliff upon which Onishi Mansion stood. The journey was mostly silent -Kira was still more than a little surprised by Kevin's facility for intrigue and weapons research- and was soon over, arriving at the main hangar level of the underground base.

"Welcome to Avalon," Kevin told Kira, stepping out of the elevator. "The hidden base, whose facilities keep me informed about all kinds of things... and grant me the strength to fend off almost anything."

Glancing around at the high-ceilinged corridors -the height of them being a clear sign to him that mobile suits were stored somewhere ahead- Kira shook his head. "I'm amazed the Seirans don't know all about this..."

"They do," Kevin told him with a thin smile. "It's why they don't dare try anything against me. They're well aware that my home ground is effectively inviolable." He waved a hand at the hatches they passed along the way, all of which were marked in precise military lettering... and most of which appeared to be armories of one sort or another. Clearly, more than just mobile weapons were stored on the hangar level. "Yes, they know that if they tried anything I'd obliterate them all. Unfortunately, that only really applies to the mansion and base; most of this stuff if woefully outdated compared to mobile suits, after all, so in an open field battle..."

"I can see," Kira acknowledged. "No wonder you never worried much about them here. Hey," he added, moving closer to one of the doors, "what's in here?"

"Don't open that," his friend said sharply, and pointed at a skull and crossbones symbol on it. "That horrid stuff is the last shipment my father moved down here; where he found it, I don't know, and I wish I could figure out how to get rid of the stuff. Unfortunately, it would require something on the order of a plasma bomb, which would be a little conspicuous here."

Kira swallowed, and resumed walking. "What _is_ in there?"

"VX nerve agent," Andy informed him, grimacing. "I'd never heard of the stuff before, but Racher here is, as you know, a student of old military technology. Turns out it's a relic from the late twentieth century A.D., a really nasty chemical weapon that causes your diaphragm to freeze up. In other words, you suffocate."

"Two hundred micrograms is enough to kill you," Kevin added grimly. "And there's about four tons of it beyond that door. Near as I can tell, Father found just about all the remaining VX on the planet and collected it, for reasons I don't think I want to know. It certainly wasn't for defense; you use this stuff too close to your own ground, and you're liable to kill yourself as well as the enemy."

"So you see," Murrue said, injecting a lighter tone into the conversation, "there actually _is_ a weapon Kevin hates more than nuclear missiles."

"Yeah," he agreed. "Nukes, for all their power, are targeted weapons; nerve agents are just indiscriminate death." The super-soldier shook his head. "I'm immune to the stuff, of course; Destroyers were all given treatments and cybernetic systems to nullify all chemical weapons. My own genetic structure plays a part in that, too. Still, I hate having any of it here. The chances of an accidental release are almost nonexistent, but you never know..."

He trailed off, as they came to the end of the corridor. A massive, armored hatch barred the way, but it slid instantly aside at a silent command from Kevin's augmentation. And beyond it...

Murrue and Andy took it in stride, having spent much time within the base since hostilities heated up again, but Kira was startled, and even Lacus -who had known of the hangar's contents but never actually seen them- gazed at the chamber with a certain degree of surprise.

To either side were two dozen units of a type Kira didn't recognize; they were squat, with reverse-jointed legs, old-fashioned radomes, railguns, and an angular fuselage with a missile module on its back. Clearly an old design, predating mobile armors and mobile suits alike, they were nonetheless impressive, and looked very capable... yet they weren't what _really_ caught his attention.

That was reserved for the imposing mobile suit at the center of the formation. Tall, with a head of the "Gundam" style -like GAT-X105 Strike and its fellows, as well as the later ZAFT models- it also possessed long, tapering wings, clawed forearms, what appeared to be concealed machine cannons to either side of its head... and what was unmistakably a twin buster rifle was held in one hand.

Despite its overall black color scheme with crimson trim, and various other differences, the head, machine cannons, and primary weapon marked it unmistakably as being of the same series as a machine once called Sturm Falke.

"What _is_ that?" Kira breathed. "It looks like..."

Kevin nodded. "MBF-M1000 Beta Nemesis. It began as the pitiful remains of Stormhawk; and after eighteen months in a tank of liquid nitrogen, being worked on by nanomachines, this is the result. Its raw power exceeds even Stormhawk, and if its weapons are less precise than your Freedom's, it makes up for it in several other ways." He nodded up at the imposing machine. "And today it's going to fly the skies again at last, for the first time in two years, to protect the _Minerva."_

"You're going to use it at full capacity, then?" Murrue asked, face carefully neutral.

"I am." He met her gaze unflinchingly. "I'm likely to be greatly outnumbered, Sis, even with the assistance of Asuka, Za Burrel, and Lunamaria Hawke. I _need_ to fight at full capacity; I'm not quite up to Kira's level, remember."

She sighed. "Just be careful then, all right? Remember, you made a dozen test units before the final prototype, and_ all_ of them blew up. If it happens here, it could destroy most of the country."

Kira glanced between the two, confused. "What a minute. What are you two talking about? Is that thing nuclear powered?"

"It is," Andy acknowledged. "Same old fission plant, with a new N-jammer canceler to replace the one used at GENESIS."

"But that's a violation of the Junius Treaty," the younger man protested. "All nuclear reactors were banned from military use-"

"This isn't military," Kevin reminded him, "and I didn't sign the Junius Treaty. Nor did any member of Project Prometheus Unchained. At worst, it's a gray area. In any case," he went on, "that's not what Murrue was talking about. The fission plant is only there to provide enough power to start the reaction in the true power source." He smiled; it was not a pleasant expression. A hungry smile, like a tiger before a hunt... "You see, it has the first practical antimatter reactor."

Kira inhaled sharply. _"Antimatter?_ But... no one has any idea how to use that kind of thing for power yet. You know as well as I do how difficult it is to control the reaction from that kind of massive energy release! The whole system should blow up the instant you generate the first gram of antimatter. I mean, sure, we use it in things like positron cannons, but there the antimatter is fired through a tubular electromagnetic field, sent away from the emitter, not contained in one place."

"Very good, Kira," the super-soldier said approvingly. "I guess you really _were_ paying attention at the college on Heliopolis; nice change from when we were kids." Kira looked pained, but Kevin quickly went on, "You're right as far as it goes, but you were never into the same kind of research my people have been doing; and you also don't know as much as I do about all the technology that was lost thanks to the Reconstruction War. Fact is, there were two primary problems with the notion of antimatter power: the amount of energy needed to synthesize the antimatter in the first place, and lack of any form of containment. As you say, antimatter tends to blow itself up the instant it comes into contact with regular matter, which means you need an absolute vacuum for it to exist, and one not made from matter, at that. Well, those two problems were effectively solved when practical fusion power was finally developed in the twenty-first century. Fusion provided enough energy to generate antimatter -as does the new-model fission reactor Nemesis has- and since fusion required containment itself, the basic principle -the same kind of magnetic containment used for positron _beams-_ could be applied to antimatter reactors, as well."

"I can see that," Kira said slowly, "but it still should've taken years to make all the adjustments. Years, and a _lot_ of experiments."

"It did," Murrue said dryly. "Prometheus built over a dozen prototypes prior to the model installed in Nemesis, and all of them exploded the moment they were activated. In fact, they wouldn't have gotten even that far had ABADDON not been researching the idea, five years ago."

"That's right," Kevin confirmed. "Remember, ABADDON had some of the most brilliant scientists of the era working for them, and not all of them were cyberneticists or geneticists. After all, things like the Excalibur strike fighter were completely beyond Oracle's knowledge. In fact, the Excalibur's final design was supposed to incorporate an antimatter reactor, though I'll confess even I'm skeptical that they could've fit one inside something that small, even if they omitted a fission reactor and went with external activation."

Kira nodded thoughtfully, head buzzing with the technical aspects of the matter. As Kevin had noted, he _had _paid attention in college, so he knew perfectly well that the process must've been more difficult than his friend was implying... and that it must also have been _extremely_ hazardous. "Okay, I can get how you managed to do it so quickly... but, Kevin, don't you realize how dangerous that thing is? If you let even a milligram of that stuff escape, you'll blow up this entire island! And if you've got an entire reactor full of it..."

"It could potentially obliterate pretty much the entire island chain," Kevin acknowledged. "I'm aware of the risks, Kira, and I assure you, I wouldn't be doing this at all if I wasn't confident in my safety systems. I may take more chances with my own life than some people would consider smart, but there's no _way_ I'd do that when Cagalli and a whole bunch of orphans are in range."

"He's right, Kira," Lacus said quietly. "I admit that I have misgivings of my own about this, but you _know_ Kevin wouldn't do this if he wasn't sure it was safe."

"I have to agree there," Murrue concurred, "though I have some concerns as far as its performance on the battlefield is concerned."

Kevin rolled his eyes. "Murrue, I have no intention of annihilating myself, okay? If I ever have to self-destruct, I'm not crazy enough to hang around." He shook his head. "Look, we don't have time for this. If I know the Earth Forces and Yuna Seiran, _Minerva_ is going to be under fire soon, and that means I have to get moving _now."_

"...I understand," Kira said reluctantly. "So, you really _are_ going back to the battlefield, then?"

"It's where I belong," Kevin said simply, and turned away. Bending his knees, he catapulted himself off the floor in a mighty leap, caught hold of Nemesis's knee, and vaulted up to the cockpit. The hatch in the center of the machine's chest dropped open at his silent command, and he swung into the waiting seat.

The cockpit was, at first glance, very similar to that of the machine's original form... but appearances were misleading. The controls were fully functional, as were the displays, but Kevin ignored them entirely, instead placing his left hand on a circular device on the arm of the seat. Contact was made between the mobile suit's systems and the neural receptor embedded in his left palm, and Nemesis' systems began to come to life... and even now, the displays remained dark.

Instead, Kevin's view of the cockpit vanished, replaced by the data relayed from Nemesis' own jade eyes to his brain. Two years before, he had -with great reluctance- experimented with vehicular neural linkages, something even ABADDON had never been able to test; now, after two years of research, he made contact with his machine's control systems and sensors with ease, and the signals his brain would normally have used to control his limbs were instead directed into Nemesis.

"Initializing antimatter reaction," he said over the machine's external speakers, even as he carried out the action. Within Nemesis' fuselage, beneath the cockpit, the majority of the fission reactor's output was redirected into another chamber... and from within, antimatter began to form. Magnetic containment fields went up at the same time, and the reaction began.

Murrue watched anxiously, though she knew well that if anything happened, none of them would have time to notice. "Is it stable?" she said at last.

"Affirmative," Kevin answered, diagnostics running through his mind. "Power flow is nominal, all systems ready. Stand back; I'm converting to mobile armor mode."

The four did as instructed; none of them knew exactly what would happen now, so it was best to stand well back in case Nemesis took up more space than expected. _I'll say this for Kevin,_ Kira thought distantly. _He doesn't do _anything_ by halves..._

Nemesis' thrusters flared then, providing just enough power to lift it off the ground, and then it doubled over, legs folding beneath the torso, arms moving inward, the buster rifle splitting in half and moving to flank the head as a shield-like piece of armor slid into place to protect it. Now fully horizontal, smaller thrusters came to life in the folded legs, keeping it in a hover as it swivelled toward the huge hatch at one end of the hangar.

"All right," Kevin said then. "Kevin Walker... Nemesis, launching!"

The hatch slid aside, revealing the sky beyond the cliff Onishi Mansion stood upon, and Nemesis' main thrusters woke, blue light flaring from them as they propelled the machine out into the blue.

"So, he's off," Lacus sighed. "I don't know whether to be glad that he's going out to help the _Minerva..._ or sad that he's going back to the battlefield."

"He'll be fine," a new voice said from behind them. "And I pity his father, if the bastard tries to get in his way."

Kira turned in surprise. "Leona? I thought you left for space already; what are you doing here?"

Leona Colde shrugged. "We're a little behind schedule; Cagalli's meeting yesterday prevented me from handing in my resignation, so I'll be heading out later today." She smiled suddenly. "Besides, I didn't want to miss the fun. I only saw him from a distance at JOSHUA and Jachin Due, you know; it'll be fun to see what he's like in a real battle."

Andy laughed. "You are two of a kind, young lady," he told her. "I can tell you've got some of Racher's genes in you; you're both possessed of gallows humor."

"I could also kill you twenty-six different ways without making a sound," she observed. "And that's only with my bare hands."

Kira covered his face with one hand. "...Just when I thought only one of Kevin could exist in this world, another one comes around... I'm just glad not everyone is like that. Kevin's like a brother, but... he enjoys war a little too much."

(_I heard that._)

* * *

"My Lord? According to radar returns, the _Minerva_ will soon be leaving our territorial waters."

At Orb's military headquarters, Yuna Roma Seiran nodded appreciatively. "Excellent... So, are all preparations in place?"

"Yes, My Lord," the soldier replied, and then hesitated. "But, ah... there's something you should probably know, Sir. Just now we caught an anomalous thermal return, from the direction of Izanagi. It looked almost like some kind of aircraft or flying mobile armor, but it disappeared within moments. It might've been just a sensor ghost, but I thought you should be informed, My Lord."

"Hm..." Yuna frowned. _Izanagi... that's where Onishi's mansion is located. And with that blasted military base his family's been refurbishing for years, who knows what he might've found... just what are you up to, Onishi? You have to know there's nothing you can do, even with those nuclear-equipped walking tanks your father imported ten years ago._

"Having problems, My Lord?"

He turned, startled, and frowned when he saw who'd spoken. "I didn't know you were cleared to be here, Miss Walker," he said cautiously, wanting to eject the young woman from the building but uncertain of whether or not she actually _did_ have such clearance. "Is there something I can do for you?"

Max shook her head, eyes narrow. "No, thank you; I'm just checking things out for my boss. And yes, I _am _cleared to be here. If you don't believe me, check the records. As I said before, I'm acting as Baron Onishi's representative, as he has pressing business... and is likely to for some time to come."

"Hm." Yuna merely grunted, unhappy about the young woman's presence but unable to do anything about it. "All right, then... just stay out of the way. We don't have time for any interference."

"Don't worry, My Lord," she assured him. "I don't intend to get in the way." _Because I don't have to...  
_

* * *

"Now exiting Orb's territorial waters, Captain," Malik Yardbirds announced on _Minerva_'s Bridge. "On course for Carpentaria Base."

Talia Gladys nodded. "Thank you, Malik. Carry on." _Looks like we made it out in time; good thing Walker doesn't hate ZAFT quite so much anymore..._

She was fairly sure that Kevin Walker had been correct in warning them to clear out. He was certainly in the best position to know; whatever his current standing in Orb's government might be, he _was_ the head of one of the Five Noble Families, which meant he had access to just about everything the Orb government did.

Besides which, Talia had a shrewd notion that the solider would soon be evacuating himself. Leaving aside his apparent estrangement from the Chief Representative, the mere fact that Orb had signed the treaty with the Earth Alliance indicated that it wouldn't be a healthy place for Coordinators to be for the foreseeable future. Admittedly, Walker himself was resourceful enough to remain alive through it all, but from what he'd said, he was more likely to try everything in his power to _break_ the Alliance. After all, however implacable his hate for ZAFT might once have been, that organization had at least learned from its mistakes, and purged most of its corrupt elements. The Earth Alliance had done nothing of the sort... and Kevin Walker would never forgive Blue Cosmos for killing his family.

Her reverie was interrupted by a sudden, tense report from Burt Heim. "Reading new radar and thermal signatures, Captain," he said tautly. "Ships appearing directly in our path."

Talia's gaze sharpened, for now the ships were appearing within visual range outside the viewport. "Can you identify them?" she asked, though she already had a good idea of who they had to be. _They're not friendlies... which means..._

"Affirmative, Captain. They're an Earth Forces naval fleet, composed mostly of _Danilov_ and _Tarawa_-class ships." Heim's jaw tightened. "Also detecting thermal signatures consistent with the new Earth Forces machines encountered during the recent attack on the PLANTs: GAT-04 Windams."

She nodded slowly. "I see. They're determined to take us down here and now..."

"Has Orb betrayed us?" Trine wondered. "The only way the Earth Forces could even know to come here..."

"New contacts on radar!" Heim barked. "Detecting a fleet directly to our rear, Captain; Orb Aegis ships and carriers, as well as several flight-equipped M1 Astrays."

Talia closed her eyes. "They're preventing us from retreating into their waters," she murmured. "Walker was right... they _did_ intend to trap us."

"I can't believe this," Trine said incredulously. "They help repair our ship, and then they try to destroy us?"

"We can worry about their thought processes later, Arthur," Talia reminded him. "Sometime when we're _not _about to engage in battle." She hit a button on the arm of her chair, activating her intercom panel. "All hands to battle stations," she announced, with a calm she didn't truly feel. "Repeat, all hands to battle stations. An Earth Alliance fleet has appeared to block our path, and Orb forces are now blocking our retreat. Therefore, we have no choice but to engage the enemy ahead of us and break through their blockade." She paused for a moment. "I won't lie to you. We're heavily outnumbered, even if the Orb fleet does nothing but block our retreat; the Earth Forces alone have several times our firepower. This will undoubtedly be our most difficult battle yet, even surpassing our struggle to stop the fall of Junius Seven... but I have faith in you all. Good luck."

"What now, Captain?" Trine asked quietly.

"Now we prepare to fight for our lives... and trust our pilots," she said simply. "It's all we _can_ do, now."

* * *

Soaring high above, at the very edge of space, Kevin Walker looked down on the Pacific Ocean with cold anger in his eyes. He could easily see the events unfolding below; Nemesis' optics were more than sufficient even from dozens of kilometers up to distinguish the two fleets flanking _Minerva_. "Seiran, you bastard," he whispered. "You truly have no honor at all, do you?"

Not that it was unexpected. That was why he was up here in the first place, bringing his formidable mobile suit along the _Minerva_'s course. He'd known what was going to happen... and he knew how to at least make sure Orb left the ship alone. And as for the Earth Forces... Well, it wouldn't be the first time he performed a blitzkrieg attack on one of their fleets.

Mental commands flashed through Nemesis' circuits, and the machine wavered into existence as the hyper jammers were deactivated. Then the whole unit unfolded, reverting to its mobile suit mode high above the Earth. _Configuration change complete,_ he thought, communing with his systems. _Activate twin buster rifle magnetic containment systems. Divert antimatter flow into TBR reaction chamber. Prepare to fire Level Three shot._

Poised in the sky like the Angel of Death, Nemesis' finger tightened on the trigger...

* * *

In _Minerva_'s hangar, Shinn raced toward the Impulse's Core Splendor, still tugging on his helmet as he ran. "What's with the battle alert?" he wondered aloud to his companion.

"I don't know," Lunamaria Hawke replied with a shrug, heading for her own ZAKU. "I guess the Earth Forces are attacking us. We'll make it, though. I'm sure of it."

_I hope you're right,_ Shinn thought, vaulting into the Core Splendor's cockpit. _Just as long as that bastard Walker doesn't get involved, friend or foe. Of course,_ he thought with a thin smile, _at least if he's an enemy, I can get rid of him. All of Orb's like that, and he's one of the worst of the lot._

The super-soldier's parting words to him hadn't helped things, either. His implication that Shinn was overconfident... _Yeah, sure, like I need to worry about _him._ He was never in the same league as the Freedom's pilot; I'm certainly not scared of _him.

Shaking off those thoughts -after all, there was no sign Walker even _could_ intervene directly- he activated his radio. "Shinn Asuka," he announced. "Core Splendor, launching!"

* * *

On the bridge of the Earth Forces flagship, Captain Lyle Tucker watched with interest as the ZAFT mobile suits launched from the _Minerva_'s catapults. Two of them were standard ZAKUs, a red Warrior and a white Phantom, which immediately took their places on the ship's deck... but one was the sole remaining prototype from Armory One, the unit identified as "Impulse".

_So, it really _does_ have four separate modules,_ he noted, as the pieces came together with the Force Silhouette to form the complete mobile suit. _I can see how versatile it makes the design... but there must be severe structural integrity issues, as well. Can they really be as dangerous as Captain Roanoke's reports suggest?_

"Is that their entire force?" he asked aloud.

"It appears so, Captain," his radar operator replied. "Three mobile suits and one ship. Our forces outnumber them greatly... and it appears the Orb fleet is holding up their end of the bargain."

Tucker nodded. "Anything unexpected?"

The officer hesitated. "I don't think so, Sir. We're getting a faint thermal source from somewhere at the extreme edge of our detection range... straight up. I don't _think_ it's anything more than a sensor ghost, but we're keeping an eye on it."

"Don't let it distract you," Tucker warned. "We're dealing with a ZAFT ship, not sensor ghosts. We can't afford any surprises here."

"Understood, Sir."

* * *

_Here they come,_ Shinn thought, scanning the area for the threats... of which there were many. A number of ships, and numerous Windams, all equipped with flight units of some kind... This wasn't going to be easy. _But if it was easy, they wouldn't need us, would they?_

"Luna, Rey," he radioed, "you two sit tight and take anything that gets close, okay? I've got the others."

"Understood," Rey replied calmly, his beam rifle already tracking the incoming hostiles. "We've got the ship covered."

"Got it, Shinn," Luna agreed. "Go get 'em."

_Time to show them what ZAFT pilots are made of!_ Feeding power to his thrusters, Shinn propelled Impulse into the sky, heading straight for the nearest cluster of Windams. "Come and get me!"

The Windams seemed happy to oblige, firing their own beam rifles as they moved to engage the ZAFT machine, but Impulse was too swift. Driven by Coordinator reflexes, it wove a dangerous path through the streaks of emerald energy, spinning in the air to avoid one blast, before yanking out a beam saber and closing to melee range.

It seemed insane. One mobile suit, however capable, should not have been a match for six... but Impulse was no ordinary mobile suit, and Shinn Asuka no ordinary pilot. Beams flashed all around him, and his intended target thrust at him with a saber of its own, but he ducked the fire and smashed the saber aside with his shield, then lashed out with his own blade of frozen fire.

The first quick slash caught his target in the upper torso, well above the cockpit, and seemed to stick for a moment; the hesitation gave another Windam a chance to try a bisecting chop, aimed at ending the battle in an instant.

_I don't think so._ Ripping his blade through a diagonal cut to free it from the first Windam, Shinn also lashed out with Impulse's foot, catching the ambushing Windam in the arm, knocking its attack off by merely two meters... just enough for it to instead plunge deep into a third Windam's torso.

Shinn's target and the one caught in "friendly fire" tore themselves apart at almost the same instant, spewing shrapnel and debris everywhere, and spurting lubricants in all directions... a red rain of hydraulic fluid, to substitute for the blood of the pilots, vaporized in the explosions.

Shinn whipped around, smashed his shield into the face of the Windam that had destroyed its fellow, and stabbed his saber deep into its cockpit, plunging all the way into the thrusters on its back. Pilot, metal, and plastics melted under the attack, lubricants and hydraulic fluid turned to steam, and a cataclysmic reaction ran through the machine as power attempted to flow through shattered systems. It held for one second, two... and detonated, sending another barrage of shrapnel and debris out into the sky.

The surviving three pilots of the unit stared in disbelief. "This can't be," one of them muttered incredulously, frantically bringing his beam rifle up to firing position. "There's no way one machine can-"

He was interrupted... but not by Shinn Asuka's blade. No, it was the titanic column of synthetic lightning that speared down from the heavens that stunned the pilot into silence.

Coming at almost the same moment that _Minerva_'s Tristan beam turrets laid into a pair of Earth Forces cruisers, the blast seemed at first almost like an extension of that fury... but only almost, and only at first. Nothing _Minerva_ had short of its Tannhauser positron cannon could produce an effect that mammoth... and Talia Gladys wouldn't have ordered it to fire at a point between _Minerva_ and the Orb fleet.

Not to mention that it came from several kilometers _above_ the action.

The azure blast swept across the ocean's surface, vaporizing water in a long line etched across the path of the Orb fleet for several moments, before fading away. Then, and only then, did a voice come over the radio. "Attention, all Orb forces in this area," a voice said coldly. "This is Captain Kevin Walker, formerly a Colonel in the Orb Ground Forces Reserve. I no longer have the authority to give you direct orders, but understand this: any Orb unit that attempts to further this treacherous action by engaging _Minerva_'s forces will be fired upon and disabled. This is your only warning."

Shinn's gaze snapped up to the black and crimson mobile suit that descended from the sky, and his lips drew back in a snarl. "Walker! Just what do you think _you're_ doing here?"

"Exactly what I said I would," Kevin replied. "Stopping my country from committing a monstrous betrayal. Understand something, Asuka: I don't like you, and I don't like ZAFT... but I like betrayal even less, particularly when it's perpetuated by a family I hate." He switched frequencies. _"Minerva,_ this is Walker. I'm coming to your assistance."

_"Roger that, Captain Walker,"_ Talia replied. _"Thanks for the assistance... though you do realize, don't you, the amount of trouble you'll be in from your own country?"_

"Doesn't matter; I don't intend to stay in Orb any longer anyway." His expression was more that of a cold serpent than a hungry tiger, but that very chill communicated his feelings to the ZAFT captain better than anything else could've.

Talia had heard why Kevin Walker's anger was so dangerous: because it did not burn, but chilled...

_"I suppose I can understand that,"_ Talia went on after a moment. _"Certainly I've heard enough about your... difficulties with the Orb government of late. Still, you_ are_ -or were- a soldier in Orb's military, as well. I'd have thought duty-"_

"I follow my own path, Talia," he cut in. "I'm a trained soldier, but I refuse to fight for a cause in which I do not believe. If that means fighting against my own country... then so be it." He turned his attention back to the battle then, separated his buster rifle into its component halves, and reached back to attach them to Nemesis' wings.

"I don't need your help, Walker," Shinn said in a low voice, glaring briefly at Nemesis. "More than that, I don't _want_ it. This isn't your fight; not since you betrayed ZAFT."

"I was never truly a part of ZAFT, Asuka," Kevin replied, opening a shoulder panel and pulling out the hilt of a beam saber. "I still use the codename Hydra from time to time, but the fact is that the person _ZAFT_ called Hydra was nothing more than a personality overlay, a false persona used to keep my body under their control. Either way," he finished, as an azure blade came to life in his hand, "this _is_ my fight... because it's my country that's betraying _Minerva_'s trust." _Besides which, I hate Yuna Seiran's guts..._

Shinn glared a moment longer, then sighed. "...Fine. Just stay out of my way, Walker, or I'll take you down, too." Not bothering to wait for a reply, he lifted his rifle and charged at the Earth Forces machines once again.

It did not yet occur to him to connect the azure weapons used by Nemesis with the fateful blast he had witnessed and hated two years before...

* * *

The ZAFT and Earth Alliance forces weren't the only ones startled by the sudden intervention of the so-called "Black Asp"; if anything, the personnel aboard the ships of the Orb fleet were even more surprised, since Nemesis' pilot was one of their own.

"That... was Baron Onishi," the fleet flagship's exec said slowly, staring at the steam still rising from the momentary "trench" the beam had carved in the water. "Captain... what are our orders?"

"Hm..." Captain Todaka, the man commanding both the ship and the fleet itself stood silent for several moments, considering the matter. To begin with, he was far from sanguine about the entire affair; repairing the ship that had saved their nation from almost certain destruction and then trying to blow it out of the water didn't sit well with him at all.

Then there was the unexpected intervention of the Baron. Though he might've resigned his military commission, the fact remained that he was the head of one of the Five Noble Families, which gave him a great deal of authority. Much of it might've been mere power of prestige, but that made it no less real... particularly in the face of his threat.

Todaka had no doubt the rogue nobleman would do exactly what he said if any Orb soldier so much as sneezed in_ Minerva_'s direction; he might limit himself to disabling attacks, but he _would_ fire. His _extremely_ pointed warning shot was proof enough of that, as was his reputation for meaning what he said.

_Yes, when one puts all the facts of the matter together..._

"We hold our fire," he said finally. "We've been given orders from one of our great nobles... and I will not risk our forces in a fruitless assault. Is that clear?"

"Very, Captain," his exec answered, nodding crisply.

After all, Todaka wasn't the only Orb soldier who felt this entire affair was disgusting, to say the least.

* * *

_Minerva_ rocked perceptibly in the wake of a near miss; Heim's report a moment later merely served to confirm what they all already knew. "We're coming under fire from the Earth Alliance ships," he said unnecessarily. "They've begun bombardment with shipboard guns."

Talia nodded. "Understood. Return fire with Tristans; but inform our mobile suits to concentrate on the opposing mobile units, Meyrin. They're the greater threat."

"Yes, Captain," Meyrin acknowledged, and relayed the orders through her headset.

While her crew carried out the engagement around her, Talia gazed with narrowed eyes at the battle itself. So far, their pilots were doing a stellar job of protecting the ship; Luna and Rey were providing excellent close-in defense from the _Minerva_'s deck -indeed, even as she watched, Luna's beam cannon spat red-orange fire and speared a Windam, blasting it apart from the inside out- while Shinn continued to engage the airborne machines at a distance from the ship.

He was also in unwilling partnership with the interloper, Nemesis; the two pilots clearly had no use for each other, yet they efficiently split the enemy forces between them with a skill that would've been exhilarating to watch had this been a historical record, rather than a current life-or-death struggle. Kevin Walker's years of experience and superior mobile suit design were very much in evidence, yet Shinn Asuka and his Impulse were fighting on a level far closer to the super-soldier's than Talia would've expected.

Their reluctant teamwork was clearly evident as they took on the three remaining machines from the first squad Shinn had attacked. Nemesis -moving with a fluidity that suggested to the Captain that neural interfacing was involved- engaged two of them simultaneously, allowing Impulse to blaze past and attack the third.

Nemesis raised its left arm, and a shield formed of pure energy lit upon it just in time to harmlessly spatter a bolt of emerald energy from the Windam that had snuck around behind it. At the same time, the azure saber in its right hand twirled through a blazing blue circle, beheading its other target in a shower of sparks before snapping downward and slicing effortlessly through the Windam's torso. Then, even as the smoldering halves fell from the sky, Nemesis spun around, panels to either side of its head popped open, and a hail of machine cannon fire shredded the second Windam's armor. The Earth Forces unit flew on for several moments, carried along by its Jet Striker pack, before keeling over and flying full-power into the ocean.

Shinn, by contrast, didn't bother the flashy maneuvers the Hydra evidently preferred. Instead, he simply rushed right for the third Windam, smashed aside its gun arm with his shield, and leveled his rifle at its cockpit from a distance of no more than three meters. Emerald light flashed, in the front and out the back, and the mobile suit blew apart.

Talia found the whole thing... strange. On the matter of Walker himself, it seemed peculiar that he had so far refrained from using his twin buster rifle, aside from his initial warning shot; according to battle records from the previous war, his current emphasis on melee combat was unusual, to say the least. _I'm also surprised he's willing to work with Shinn at all; it's clear they don't like each other, and Walker's never exactly had a reputation for putting up with people he dislikes... and nor does Shinn usually tolerate Walker this easily. Hm; perhaps it's just the exigencies of this battle._

More interesting, perhaps, was what Lunamaria Hawke must have felt when Nemesis dropped from the sky to assist; Talia was well aware that neither of the Hawke siblings had been exactly comfortable around the Orb soldier since learning of the exact circumstances of their older sister's death. At best, she had to be feeling ambivalent; at worst, it might well be that only the fact that her captain clearly had no problems with Walker's intervention kept her from opening fire on Nemesis...

* * *

"Not bad," Kevin remarked to Shinn, powering through the sky toward the next batch of Earth Forces dogs. "Better than I might've expected from a rookie."

"Don't underestimate me, Walker," Shinn grunted back, distantly resentful of the way Nemesis -born from the remains of a machine of a more powerful generation than his own unit- easily outstripped Impulse's speed. "You're not the only one who can fight; and the way I heard it, you were never properly trained as a mobile suit pilot to begin with."

"Not quite correct," Kevin disputed. "Tanya was helping me through a GINN training program near the end of the Project. I'll admit, though, that most of my training _was_ on the job... and facing off against four enemies a sight more difficult than anything _you've_ ever fought, kid. Compared to the old Le Creuset team, those Earth Forces pilots who stole your new prototypes were less than nothing. In fact-"

_"Onishi, just what do you think you're doing?"_

The super-soldier sighed inwardly. "One moment, Asuka; a certain insect has decided to rant at me." Not waiting for a reply, he switched his transmitter to the frequency of the incoming transmission. "Hello, Yuna. You know, I really don't have time to chat; I'm a little busy right now, with these Earth Forces fleas."

_"You're also in violation of the new treaty, Onishi!"_ Yuna snapped. _"Just what do you think you're doing out there, helping Coordinators? You know that won't endear you to our new allies-"_

_"Your_ new allies," Kevin corrected coldly. "I've no intention of observing any such 'alliance'; I have standards, unlike you. And incase you've forgotten, _I_ happen to be a Coordinator... as is our Chief Representative. Still, I'm not exactly doing this because I think of them as 'my people' or anything; I nearly killed a good friend of mine two years ago because he _did_ fight for such a reason." He glared at the image that had appeared in his vision -as he was still tied into Nemesis' own perceptions- and his eyes were jade ice. "Now, I have better things to do than listen to a traitorous, infantile insect. Get off this channel, or I'll drop by and obliterate the building you're standing in. Walker out."

Shinn intercepted an emerald dart with his shield, and glanced briefly at Nemesis. "I'll say this for you, Walker," he remarked. "We've got one thing in common: we both hate the Orb government."

"I hate them for different reasons, Asuka," Kevin replied, "and I don't hate all of them. But yes... I think we're in agreement about _that_ vnyebrachnyi." Cutting power to his thrusters momentarily, Nemesis dropped into freefall, allowing a Windam which had been heading straight for it to simply fly right past, its pilot firing several shots from his rifle before he realized what had happened.

The last thing he saw, as Nemesis' verniers kicked in again, was an azure flash...

* * *

"Well, that's a surprise," Leona remarked, gazing at the control center's displays. "Kevin and Shinn actually fighting together.. Under other circumstances, I doubt that would be possible."

Kira glanced at her. "They don't get along?"

She smirked. "The first time they met, Shinn made the mistake of accusing Kevin of murdering his comrades in ABADDON; Kevin responded by nearly taking Shinn's head off with that arm blade of his. Generally, they exchange insults and rants... except in battle. Perhaps they simply figure they have better things to expend their anger on than each other."

"Huh; sounds like how Kevin was with Dearka, before the Buster was captured. Except the two of them _were_ shooting at each other..." Kira shook himself. "But what did he do when he first got there? That beam wasn't as_ large_ as some that I saw the old Stormhawk fire, but the intensity..."

"He channeled some of his reactor mass through the twin buster rifle," Murrue explained. "One of the more unique aspects of Nemesis' design, and also somewhat risky. When he does that, narrow conduits from the reactor all the way through the arms are opened, with a magnetic containment field keeping it all stable. Antimatter flows along the conduits to the power plugs in the machine's hands, and from there into the weapon." She shook her head. "Erica and some of his other engineers tried to convince him to use antimatter 'power packs' instead, because that would remove the risk of containment failure along the way, but he said that he prefers the flexibility of the direct feed from the reactor."

"It does give him better control over the power flow," Andy pointed out. "And Foxhound's version has more redundant safety systems, remember; he won't be dealing with this for long. Besides, he's not one to be that flashy very much, anyway."

"Foxhound?" Kira repeated, frowning. "What's that?"

"MBF-X15A/M Foxhound," Murrue supplied. "A/M stands for antimatter. It's Kevin's next-generation mobile suit, recently completed at Artemis Base. It incorporates even more advanced technology than Nemesis... though both machines use the same operating system. 'Generation: Unsubdued Nuclear-Driven Anti-Matter reactor system'."

_That_ much Kira actually found mildly amusing. _Does _every_ mobile suit operating system have the "Gundam" acronym?_ he wondered.

"Well," he heard Leona murmur, "the game's afoot... I just hope this battle doesn't get as 'interesting' as it has the potential to."

Lacus looked at her curiously. "What do you mean, Leona?"

The older woman sighed. "Let's just say, mon ami, that Shinn has an older connection to Kevin Walker than he realizes... one Kevin wishes did not exist. And if Shinn _does_ realize it, we may be getting an even more impressive demonstration of Nemesis' capabilities today."

* * *

"I don't believe this," Lunamaria Hawke muttered, firing yet another shot into the sky against yet another Windam... even as more of the new Earth Forces machines approached. "I just don't see how they can _have_ this many mobile suits!"

"That _is_ a sizable fleet over there," Rey Za Burrel reminded her, taking careful aim with his own rifle. "And we don't exactly have time to complain about it; their reinforcements will be here any moment." His finger tightened on the trigger then, and an emerald bolt streaked skyward.

The pilot of the Windam he'd targeted had time for a brief cry... and his machine, pierced through the pelvis, blew apart in the air.

Luna shook her head. She was far from a bad shot herself, but sometimes the abilities of her comrades surprised even her. Rey fought with cool precision and Shinn with a certain fire which usually proved just as effective. And in this battle, there was also the Hydra...

She had very mixed feelings as far as that man was concerned, but even she had to admit that he was quite a pilot. He might be right in his claim to being an inferior pilot compared to the man who'd flown the Freedom during the last war, but he was obviously no slouch himself. The way he manipulated his menacing mobile suit and its peculiar azure beam saber was proof enough of that...

_I just don't understand,_ Luna thought, watching as Nemesis pirouetted around a Windam, lashed out with its azure blade, and cut a blazing slash down its center. _He's a hero, a legend... and yet he was the one who killed Erica. He fights to defend a ZAFT ship, despite his own hatred for ZAFT... yet he was also the one who killed his own comrades, people as close to him as family..._

She knew the story he'd told, that his mind had been broken by the torture and inhuman experiments that had been performed on him, and she wanted to believe it... but she couldn't quite, and she was honest enough to admit that a part of her wanted nothing more than the vengeance he himself often meted out upon his enemies.

_But Erica wouldn't have wanted us to "avenge" her... would she?_

Shaking her head, trying to clear her thoughts, Luna raised her cannon to the sky and speared a Windam with another streak of red-orange fire. Whatever the future might hold, however her history with Walker might finally resolve itself, she had a job to do, here and now... and she would do it. _My duty right now... is to the living aboard_ Minerva..._ to Meyrin and the others...  
_

* * *

Cagalli came bursting into Orb's military headquarters at a dead run, and paused in the doorway, panting for breath.

She'd come in a great hurry when she realized a battle was underway; after all, her first clue of the battle had been a rather blatant one... considering that an azure beam ninety meters in diameter, coming from several kilometers in the sky, can be seen from quite a distance.

Up until that very moment, Cagalli had been unsure of how much of what Kevin had told her the day they'd last parted had been true; in his anger, she'd felt he might have been exaggerating. That beam, though... it could have come from only one thing, which meant -particularly given its intensity; far greater than she remembered- that he had indeed rebuilt and refitted Stormhawk. So far as she knew, only that machine had _ever_ fired azure beams; it had been his trademark, during the war.

_But what could he possibly be fighting?_ she'd wondered, which was why she was here. In all honesty, she wouldn't have put it past him for him to attack an Earth Alliance fleet that had simply been stopping by a new member of the Alliance... but had he done so, he wouldn't have fired what was clearly a warning shot.

He'd have fired to kill, and begun the attack without any warning at all.

"Good morning, Lady Cagalli," Max said softly, near one of the battle displays. "Come to watch the fun?"

"You call this fun?" Cagalli retorted, moving to stand next to the "older" woman. "What's going _on_ out there? I know Kevin's involved somehow, but..."

"The Earth Forces ambushed _Minerva_ the instant she was out of Orb's territory," Max explained, nodding at the display. "Seiran promptly ordered Home Fleet to move into position to block any attempt by the _Minerva_ to reenter our waters. Unfortunately for the best laid plans of mouse and men, Kevin anticipated the whole thing, and took off in Nemesis to lend _Minerva_ a hand; that blast you saw was him warning Home Fleet to stay out of the fight, or else."

Cagalli closed her eyes. "I knew this was going to happen... or at least I should've." She looked over at the former AI. "So... how is Kevin doing. Is... is he safe?"

Max raised an eyebrow. "Is _he_ safe? Lady Cagalli, there's not a machine in the Earth Alliance's inventory that could so much as scratch Nemesis' paint. Believe me, the only people in real danger out there are the Earth Forces Windams."

Recalling Kevin's virulent hatred for the Earth Forces, Cagalli shuddered. She had no doubt the sandy-haired soldier was doing his very best to destroy anything of theirs that got within his reach... and that he would almost certainly continue his new self-assigned mission even after assuring _Minerva_'s safety.

"Still," she said after a moment, "what's Yuna doing here personally?"

Max shrugged. "Making sure the Fleet does what its told, I'd guess. The military's not real happy with him over this one, I think, so he's here to keep an eye on them." She grinned suddenly. "Let me tell you, he was _not_ happy when Nemesis turned up. I just don't think those two get along..."

* * *

Captain Tucker watched the battle with a slow nod of grudging appreciation. "They're good," he murmured, seeing _Minerva_ intercept salvo after salvo of missiles, while the mobile suits dueled with each other from afar. "Better than I expected... and the intervention of that interloper is making things interesting, as well." He turned his head slightly. "Sensors, have you identified that black machine yet?"

"Negative, Captain," his detection officer replied, typing furiously at his console. "It's not in the catalogue... but it _does_ seem to have used a weapon of the type classified as 'buster' weaponry in the first war."

Tucker twitched in his chair. "That shot was from a buster rifle? Then... that must be..."

"Confirmed, Captain," his radio operator called, anticipating his next question. "Radio intercepts on Orb frequencies indicate the interloper's pilot is Kevin Walker., also known as Baron Onishi."

Tucker cursed. "Baron Onishi and the Crimson Tiger are one and the same? I see... that explains much. Communications, make a note of that for our after-action report. The desk jockeys at Heaven's Base will be interested in that information."

"Noted, Sir."

"In the meantime..." He smiled slowly. "I believe it's time to test the Zamza-Zah, while they've still got some fight in them... and before the Tiger ruins everything. Let them see the fruits of our latest R&D efforts."

* * *

Talia frowned, as the fire from the Earth Forces fleet began to slacken. _Something isn't right here,_ she thought, eyes narrow. "They're trying something new," she murmured. "But what...? What can they have up their sleeve that they haven't used already?"

Burt Heim was already attempting to answer that very question, and he bent all his attention on his own displays... and tilted his head in puzzlement when the data came in. "They've launched something else, Captain," he called. "It's not in our catalogue, but it appears to be a mobile armor of some kind."

"Show me," she ordered. A moment later, the image appeared on the main monitor, and her frown deepened. There was something about that crab-like mobile armor that she didn't like... if only because it was odd for the Earth Forces to be using mobile armors at all at this point. The first war had demonstrated rather conclusively that mobile armors simply weren't a match for mobile suits, except for units like the Moebius Zero and the new Exus design.

_Still... if they're bothering to use it at all, even knowing that, then there must be something different about this model..._

"I don't like the looks of that thing," Talia said at last. "Chen... charge the Tannhauser. I don't want that mobile armor anywhere near this ship."

Trine started in surprise. "Captain, that's-"

"I'm aware of the potential dangers of contamination," she said, cutting him off. "But under the circumstances, I'm willing to risk it."

_"Probably a good idea, Talia,"_ Kevin said over the radio; he had been listening in even as he fought. _"I've got good intelligence people, but I never even heard a whisper of this thing, and that makes me nervous. Besides,"_ he added, a faint smile detectable even in his voice, _"I've done that kind of thing myself. I was in charge of _Archangel_'s CIC during the Battle of Alaska, and I ended up ordering a Lohengrin strike myself when I got annoyed enough."_

"I've heard," Talia replied dryly. "In this case, however, it's survival I'm concerned with, not vengeance. I don't have the luxury of indulging in that, given my position."

_"Obviously not. The only reason _I_ can is because I'm a free agent, not someone with a position of responsibility."_

"Indeed." She glanced over her shoulder. "Chen?"

"Tannhauser charged," the fire control officer responded, tapping at his console. "Ready to fire on your command, Captain."

"Good." Talia hesitated a moment longer, watching as the mobile armor came closer... and then gave the order. "Target the unknown mobile armor, and fire Tannhauser."

* * *

In the moment before the Tannhauser fired, Kevin put away his azure blade and combined his buster rifle into its complete form again, targeted the Zamza-Zah, and pulled his own trigger in one smooth motion. He liked the looks of it no better than Talia, and preferred to make absolutely certain of the kill. He didn't use full power this time, or even two thirds (itself equivalent to a full-powered blast from an older model TBR), but he expected even a standard shot from his rifle would prove sufficient.

So it was that a red-orange stream burst forth from _Minerva_'s bow, while at the same time a bolt of azure light was spat from Nemesis' buster rifle, with both shots aimed at the same target. _Minerva_'s crew and pilots, and for that matter Kevin himself, believed the assault would leave less than ashes behind it, and so it would've been... under normal circumstances.

But these were far from normal.

An instant before the beams struck it, the Zamza-Zah generated a strange, multifaceted shield several meters out from its hull, neatly intercepting the incoming energy barrage. There was a titanic flash of light from it... but when it faded, the mobile armor was fully intact.

"What in the world just happened?" Shinn demanded, staring in shock at what had occurred. "That should've-"

"Positron reflector," Kevin seethed, eyes frigid. "My people have experimented in the area, and one of our early machines, Wraith, used an early experimental model during the last war. We've been refining it since... but I never expected the Earth Forces to come up with their own version."

"Wonderful," the black-haired pilot grunted, rushing toward the mobile armor to try his own luck. "So how do you _stop_ it?"

"Not sure," the super-soldier admitted, casting his gaze around for other targets. "Defense mechanisms aren't my area; and since I wasn't expecting to face an enemy equipped with one of those things, I haven't been paying as much attention to the technical details of our models as I should've been. Doesn't help that our own version is only just now ready for field testing... and with the original model, a weapon with the raw power of a Tannhauser ought to have broken through. It could stop positron beams, but not with that much power behind it."

"You're a help," Shinn said sarcastically, firing at the Zamza-Zah... which, to his frustration, dodged every shot he fired. It was far more maneuverable that it should be... and that wasn't the only thing bothering him. _Something about those shots Walker fired,_ he thought. _What is it they remind me of...?_

A moment later, as Nemesis zeroed in on several more Windams and began spitting bolts of synthetic lightning from its buster rifle, it hit him. _That day, two years ago,_ he thought, eyes suddenly wide. _That blue beam... that bolt of manmade lightning that killed my family...!_

Kevin was concentrating solely on his targets at that point, starting to pick them off with carefully allocated bursts of azure light, and so was totally unprepared for the shout of pure rage and hatred that came over his speakers. _"Murderer!"_ Shinn shouted, turning his rifle toward Nemesis.

"What the-" The super-soldier reacted faster than any normal human could've, thrusting Nemesis to one side in time to avoid the first streaks of emerald light, but Impulse kept coming despite the demonstration of speed. "What do you think you're doing, Asuka?" he demanded; over the radio, he could hear Talia demanding the same thing. "I've been called that before, and with some justification, but I can assure you it's been years since I did any such thing."

"You murderer," Shinn repeated, pursuing Nemesis with enraged persistence. "Two years ago, it was you... _it was you who killed my family!"_

_Uh oh..._

In the cockpit of her ZAKU, Luna jerked in surprise. "What...? What is he talking about? Weren't they killed by..." The whole notion struck an unpleasant chord, given her own family's history with the Black Asp. _Could he have done that to Shinn, too...?_

"I'd heard it was stray fire from the Earth Forces," Rey murmured. "Apparently not..."

"Asuka," Kevin said now, using his enhanced reactions to narrowly dodge every shot fired toward him, "I'm going to tell you this once, and only once: stop shooting at me, or I'll bring you down. I told you death awaits the overconfident, and if you think you can take me, that's exactly what you are. It also makes you _stupid_, since in case you didn't notice, we're in the middle of a battle with the _real_ enemy right now!" Indeed, with Shinn suddenly intent on killing _him,_ he was forced to split his attention between dodging the Impulse's fire and sending enough azure bolts toward the Zamza-Zah to keep _it_ busy.

"I told you I didn't need or want your help in this battle," Shinn shot back, "and I refuse to fight alongside a murderer like you! You'll pay for what you did!"

"It was war, Asuka," the super-soldier told him, energizing his left beam shield briefly to spatter another shot. "Civilian casualties happen in war no matter how hard we try to prevent them... and the fact is that I have no idea how your family could've died from one of my shots."

_"Liar!"_ Impulse's rifle stopped firing, and was withdrawn to the machine itself; a moment later, the now free hand yanked out a beam saber, and a blade of frozen fire flickered to life. "Don't you _dare_ try to tell me that!"

Fire met lightning in a clash of brilliant light, as Kevin intercepted the first, rage-fueled slash with his own blade, held in Nemesis' left hand. "Listen to me, kid, I'm not trying to deny it happened; the only way you could've known to connect my shots with what happened in Orb was if you'd seen some of my fire yourself; and my 'sixth sense' tells me you're telling the truth. But I don't know _how_ it happened, because I don't remember ever firing a shot in that direction... so it's not as if I did it on purpose."

"I don't care!" Shinn withdrew his blade from the clash, and lashed out again, ignoring the azure beam that flashed from Nemesis' right hand to a point over his shoulder; he knew it was aimed for the mobile armor, not him, so he concentrated all his attention on getting one good slice -just _one_- through his enemy's defenses. "And don't try to tell me you wouldn't do the same! You've taken revenge too many times yourself for you to lecture _me,_ you bastard!"

"Only for deliberate acts," Kevin shot back, slapping the scarlet blade aside with his own. "Even in my wilder days, I _never_ killed over accidents or mistakes. I did things I regret, sure; in those days, I would go to terrible lengths to get information from my enemies. But not like what you're doing, Asuka. Never like this." His voice and eyes turned even colder. "I'll let you in on another little secret: I don't enjoy killing. In fact, I'm sick of all the blood I have on my hands. But if you don't stop acting like a vengeance crazed _brat,_ I'll gladly make an exception for you!"

"Just shut up... and _die!"_ Shinn thrust forward one more time, ignoring the commands from higher authority to stop... and his opponent finally tired of the game.

_Enough of this._ Kevin Walker had not been feared on the battlefields of the First Earth/ZAFT War for nothing; though he was not as good a pilot as his friend Kira, he also wasn't horrible, and he had far more experience than the fresh-trained rookie who confronted him. _You've been in a half-dozen skirmishes, kid; I've been through a couple of dozen skirmishes and several pitched battles, including Alaska, Orb, and Second Jachin. If you think a pup like you can best me... think again._

Those thoughts flashed through his stimulant-accelerated mind in less than two seconds, so even as Shinn's blade darted in for a killing thrust at Nemesis' cockpit, his own azure blade flashed out like the lightning it resembled, slashing slightly under the path of the incoming blade... and curving just slightly upwards...

Shinn stared in utter shock as the blade of synthetic lightning arced upward, slashed precisely between Impulse's hand and the fiery blade that sprouted from it... and cut the top of his saber. "What the-!"

"A little trick I learned from a friend, Asuka," Kevin said coldly, as the scarlet sword flickered out. "I told you that you were overconfident; looks like you needed an object lesson to realize that. Now if you'll just return your attention to the battle at hand, I'll ask Talia to forget about it, and you won't even get in any official trouble. Persist, and I'll do what I have to in order to defend myself, and explain things to Durandal later. Am I understood, rookie?"

Impulse's pilot glared at Nemesis' menacing, obsidian form, feeling the bitter taste of failure. One thing was certain: if he were ever to defeat that demonic machine and its murderous pilot, it would not be today... not until he knew how to compensate its fearsome power, and its pilot's inhuman reflexes. "You _bastard..."_

"I didn't hear you, Asuka," Kevin said quietly, his buster rifle snapping up to point directly at Impulse's head. "I said, am I understood?"

Shinn simply glared a moment longer, then finally glanced away. ":Just stay away from me," he hissed. "I'll leave it be for now, if you'll just stay away from me." His gaze came back up defiantly. "But don't think this is over, Walker!"

"Don't worry," the super-soldier said softly, recalling things from his own past he'd have preferred to keep buried. "I know it's not..."

* * *

"What on earth is going on out there?" Cagalli wondered, seeing the brief, violent confrontation between Impulse and Nemesis. "Why did Impulse attack Kevin like that? Aren't they on the same side in this battle?"

"They are," Max confirmed. "Unfortunately, Kevin found out from some of Asuka's ranting on the _Minerva, _before we hit atmosphere, that he was the one who killed Asuka's family. Still not sure exactly how that happened -haven't yet had time to check through battle records from the attack two years ago- but Asuka's reference to a blue beam was a clear indication. You know as well as any of us that only Stormhawk used blue beams in the first war."

Cagalli nodded in dawning comprehension. "And when he recognized the shots Kevin was firing at that mobile armor, he tried to take revenge..."

"Indeed; and it tells me that he's someone who does _not_ belong in the cockpit." The former AI shook her head. "You _don't_ let someone with that much emotional baggage into the military. The only reason I consider Kevin an exception to that rule is that his sheer discipline keeps it all in check. Doesn't look like that holds true for Asuka."

"I guess not..."

Several steps away, a detection officer stiffened in his chair. "My Lord," he called, _"Minerva_ is beginning to turn back toward Orb waters."

Yuna nodded slightly. "Very well. Communications, inform Captain Todaka that he's to begin firing warning shots... and that if _Minerva_ persists in trying to reenter our territory, he's to fire for effect."

The radio operator hesitated. "Understood, My Lord... but what about Baron Onishi's warning? He gave strict orders _not_ to fire on _Minerva_'s forces, and also said that if we tried-"

"He wouldn't dare," Yuna interrupted. "Moreover, he no longer has any authority over the military; his resignation is on record." He glared at the radio operator. "Send the message, Lieutenant."

"Yes, My Lord. At once."

Cagalli started toward him. "What are you doing, Yuna?" she demanded. "They're the only reason Orb even still exists! Now you'd-"

Yuna shook his head. "Please, Cagalli, this is no time to be motivated by sentimentalism. That ship is now officially our enemy, and therefore cannot be allowed back into our waters. We're merely abiding by the provisions of the treaty."

"The treaty you and your father forced down all our throats," a new voice said derisively. "You disgust me even more than my brother's plans now do, Seiran."

Both nobles turned in surprise, and even Max looked surprised as the presence registered to her own empathic sense. "Rondo Mina Sahaku?" she breathed. "What is she...?"

"What are you doing here, Sahaku?" Yuna asked, barely holding his temper in check.

"Keeping an eye on things," she replied, nodding at the battle. "Perhaps you've forgotten, since he and I were enemies for most of the last war, but Kevin and I were actually close friends when we were children... and our operations have since intermingled to some extent. His orbital personnel informed mine of what was taking place, so I thought I should drop by and see what was happening."

Yuna's fist clenched. "And what, may I ask, are you going to do now that you _are_ here?"

"At the moment, nothing," Mina said simply. "But that's only because I don't see what even AMATU could do that Nemesis isn't already. I'll be keeping on eye on things, though. Count on it."

* * *

"We're receiving orders to open fire on the _Minerva,_ Captain," the flagship's radio operator reported. "Warning shots at first, but we're to target the ship directly if she continues on course."

More than one officer looked uneasy at that; the Baron's message had been pretty unambiguous... considering that it had begun with a very large blast of antimatter. They were all wondering if it was really a good idea to, first of all, defy the head of one of the Five Noble Families... and second, if it was even safe to.

Todaka considered that for several moments, then smiled slowly. "Reply that... our fire control systems are currently malfunctioning, and we are unable to achieve weapons lock; therefore, it is currently impossible to carry out those orders." He paused. "And... Lieutenant?"

The radio operator, looking considerably relieved -and perhaps a touch smug; the Seirans weren't exactly the most popular family, as far as the military was concerned- paused as he reached for the radio controls. "Yes, Sir?"

"Tell Engineering to get on the matter at once. I'm sure they'll find the problem soon enough."

Translation: create one so that Yuna wouldn't suspect they were more interested in avoiding being blasted than carrying out such dishonorable orders, even if he had people check for a problem.

"Yes, Sir," the radio operator agreed cheerfully, and relayed the appropriate orders.

_A pity Baron Onishi looks to be leaving,_ Todaka thought, turning back to the battle. _I'd much rather see him directing military affairs than Yuna Seiran... and I'd certainly much rather see him be the one to marry Lady Cagalli. I hope he knows what he's doing...  
_

* * *

Bolts of emerald energy flashed across the sky, missiles arced and exploded, bullets screamed through the air, and lances of synthetic lightning crisscrossed through it all, as forces from the Earth Alliance and ZAFT, as well as a single third party, tried to obliterate each other.

Of all the fighters on either side, from the crew of the _Minerva_ -still trying to reach Orb waters despite orders from Yuna Seiran to the contrary- and the men and women aboard the Earth Forces ships, to the pilots on both sides, only the pilot of the Zamza-Zah and Kevin Walker were having any enjoyment at all.

The Earth Forces pilot was pleased at how the Impulse's pilot was unable to harm him; Kevin was having a moment of inner amusement at the bit of knowledge he _hadn't_ shared with Shinn, when the black-haired pilot tried to kill him.

The knowledge that even victory would've brought him nothing but death.

_Pathetic idiot,_ Kevin thought, snapping off yet another shot from his buster rifle, its synthetic lightning ripping a Windam apart. _Even if he'd done something catastrophic, only by killing me directly without hitting anything vital would've saved his life. Damaging the reactor systems... the failsafes would've protected most of the surrounding area, but the bang would still be big enough to reduce Impulse to its constituent atoms. Or more likely, simply convert the entire mobile suit to energy..._

On the other hand, he was not at all certain Shinn would've cared even if he _had_ known. Once upon a time, even the Crimson Tiger had cared more for vengeance than for the preservation of his own life...

Shinn, for his part, was no longer even thinking of the altercation, except inasmuch as it was a smoldering fire in the back of his mind, spurring him on as he continued to fire upon the Zamza-Zah, hoping to find some kind of weak spot, something that would allow him to break through its seemingly impenetrable positron reflector. At the same time, he was having to dance around everything _it_ threw at _him,_ and even with the Force Silhouette's maneuverability, that wasn't easy.

Besides which, he was beginning to run dangerously low on power.

In the middle of his stream of vile silent curses, the Zamza-Zah made another leap for the Impulse, and Shinn had to quickly dash to his right to avoid it, sideslipping in the air, while he triggered another emerald dart of his own.

The bright streak spattered against the positron reflector... and the Earth Forces pilot saw his chance.

The next attack came faster than Shinn expected, and he cried out in surprise as one of the mobile armor's claws fastened on Impulse's left leg. "No!"

Nemesis' head snapped around, obeying the instinctive command Kevin's brain tried to send his own neck, and the super-soldier cursed inwardly at what he saw. _Solkin syn! The kid's trapped; and if I try to fire now, I'll just blow him up along with it!_ Under other circumstances that might not have concerned him; unfortunately, he was well aware _Minerva_ would take a dim view of it... and he had become aware that Lunamaria Hawke was as close as anyone to Shinn. If that was so... _I've hurt that family too much already. I can't take a friend away from her, too... not when he isn't even trying to kill me right now._

Helplessness. It was not a feeling Kevin Walker was accustomed to; but then, it was rare that he ran into anything he couldn't shoot his way out of, when he was operating under his true persona. But helplessness was exactly what he felt now, for he could think of only two ways he could possibly defeat the Zamza-Zah. One was to try his twin buster rifle's third setting again, and hope -probably in vain- that its colony-killing power would break through the positron reflector. The other was to attempt to enter melee range, and carve it up. He was privately certain he could manage the latter... but even with the Nemesis' hyper jammers, the mobile armor would still have enough warning to destroy Impulse before he got there.

For the first -and possibly last- time, Kevin found himself praying that Shinn Asuka would pull a rabbit out of his hat and find a way to survive.

* * *

Shinn Asuka was trapped, and he knew it... and railed at himself in helpless anger, for he also could think of nothing he could possibly do about it. The Zamza-Zah, which had taken everything he'd thrown at it without breaking a sweat, had his Impulse caught like a mouse in a trap.

_This isn't right,_ he thought in frustration. _There has to be _something_ I can do! _Every struggle came to no avail, and his power was beginning to fail...

"Too bad, Coordinator," the Zamza-Zah's pilot transmitted, just as Impulse's phase-shift armor finally ran out of power. "Guess you just don't have what it takes." The mobile armor's claw clenched tighter... and Impulse's left leg was torn away from its body.

Impulse fell.

Only distantly aware of the calls over the radio, frantically asking him if he was all right, of the Nemesis suddenly vanishing from sight behind the cloak of its hyper jammers, Shinn fell within his own mind, even as his machine fell around him.

_Is this the end? Everything I've done so far... does it all end here, defeated by this Earth Forces machine before I can defend my friends?_ Despair called out to him; oblivion called, as well, and Shinn rather thought it wouldn't be so bad, after the magnitude of his failure. _Mom, Dad, Mayu... I'll see you soon..._

That though drew him up short. _Wait a second... they've already died, but their killer still lives... and they wouldn't want me to just give up and die. Not until I've killed Walker, and not until I've defeated the enemy!_

"I'm not going to be killed by this thing!"

Within Shinn Asuka's mind, a crimson seed burst...

"Meyrin," he radioed, suddenly acutely aware of his surroundings again, with a rage similar to that which he'd directed against Kevin roaring in the back of his mind, "activate the Deuterion Recharge System, and send me the Sword Silhouette and a new leg flyer, fast."

_"Got it!"_ Meyrin responded instantly, startled but relieved. _"Activating power transmission now!"_

Watching through Nemesis' optical and electromagnetic sensors, Kevin was surprised and impressed by Shinn's sudden recovery. _He's no Kira Yamato,_ he thought, _and with that temper, he'll never be a match for me... but he's quick, I'll give him that._

The beam of transmitted energy from _Minerva_ reached out to Impulse, and its thrusters flared in a fast fall recovery as its energy reserves quickly recharged. Rifle in one hand, shield in the other, even with one leg gone the mobile suit looked impressive as it hung in the air. Suddenly alive and ready for battle once again.

Without even waiting for the new equipment to arrive, Shinn tossed aside his rifle, yanked out a saber, and brought the scarlet blade to life as he rushed for the Zamza-Zah. Twitching from side to side to avoid the last-ditch shots from the mobile armor -whose pilot had gone from smugly satisfied to terrified- he lashed out with the blade of frozen fire, dragging it down through the air, past the supposedly impenetrable positron reflector, down into the mobile armor's hull.

Armor melted, circuitry fried, hydraulic fluid turned to vapor... and displays exploded within the Zamza-Zah's cockpit. The pilot had only enough time to see a flash of scarlet, and open his mouth to scream...

_Nichevo!_ Kevin thought, seeing the mobile armor fall away, then blow itself apart in a sower of sparks and shrapnel. _That kid's a Berserker!_

"That kid" now proceeded to jettison his backpack and damaged legs, recombine with the replacement parts from_ Minerva,_ and pour power into his thrusters on a course directly for the Earth Alliance fleet. "Walker!" Shinn barked. "If you want to make yourself useful, keep those Windams off me!"

Mildly irritated at being addressed in such a manner, Kevin was nonetheless happy to comply with that particular request. "Roger that... rookie."

Commands flashed through Nemesis' computers at the speed of thought, reaching into the twin buster rifle's power settings. Other commands flickered further on from there, and power from the antimatter reactor was allocated to the rifle.

Nemesis' finger squeezed on the trigger, and an azure beam ninety meters in diameter -just under a third the maximum size of a Level Two discharge- flashed across the sky, right into the middle of the last concentration of Windams.

* * *

"Does anyone have any idea what happened out there?" Murrue wondered aloud, gazing at the battle display in Avalon Base's control center. "What just happened with Impulse... and why he attacked Kevin a few minutes ago?"

"I can't say for sure about the first question," Leona told her, her own eyes locked on the image, "though I have my suspicions. As to the second... well, that's why I said we might be getting a more impressive display of Nemesis' capabilities today. It seems that, two years ago, an errant shot from MBF-M1000 Stormhawk somehow struck solid ground... and wiped most of a family off the face of the earth."

Lacus closed her eyes. "Shinn Asuka's family."

"Exactly. Kevin tells me he has no idea how it happened, but from Asuka's reference to a blue beam, there's not much doubt that it was indeed a shot from Stormhawk." The genetically-enhanced soldier shrugged. "We'd hoped to keep the whole thing under wraps until we had a chance to check the old visual records from the battle, since we figured Asuka's reaction would be... well, essentially what it was. Unfortunately, that appears to have been impossible."

"With all those azure beams flying around, I'd call that impossible," Andy agreed. "So, what about Impulse's performance now? Is that what I think it is?"

"Probably." It was Kira who answered the question, though, not Leona. "It reminds me of the battle just before we rendezvoused with the Eighth Fleet, two years ago... and the last time I fought Athrun." He turned to Leona. "You never mentioned this Shinn Asuka also has the SEED."

She shrugged. "I didn't know. Never even suspected until just now; and neither did Kevin, I can tell you that much. He and I may be empaths, but we can't sense what's going on in a person's subconscious. We're not telepaths." She raised an eyebrow. "Still, speaking of battle performance... I would've expected you to be more concerned about Kevin shooting everything in sight."

Kira shook his head. "Not really. I don't like it... but I understand why he's doing it."

He chose not to say anything more on the matter; he honestly wasn't sure how much of it Kevin wanted known to anyone else. For that matter, he suspected the super-soldier wouldn't have told even Kira had he not felt the need to clear up the issue.

_"I know you don't like the way I fight, Kira,"_ Kevin had said once, during the last war. _"Believe it or not, I don't like killing much more than you do. Fact is, though, that I wasn't trained to take prisoners, except under very specific circumstances... like what happened with Garcia, at Artemis. I was a member of a covert special ops group, and we were trained to shoot to kill, not disable. More than that... it's the experience of over a year on the run at work. I _had_ to kill in those days, just to stay alive. That doesn't go away, Kira. You only killed a few times, compared to me; you changed your own course before it became genuine force of habit. Me, it's settled into me now, and I don't see it changing. Certainly not for a long, long time. You don't throw off the habits that have kept you alive so easily, Kira, not when they've done so for as long as they have me."_

And that was why, though he was saddened by it, Kira knew better than to protest. It wasn't Kevin's fault that he was what he was.

It wasn't his fault that his own father and a group of mad cyberneticists had made him into the Angel of Death.

* * *

The personnel of the Earth Forces naval fleet began to suspect something was wrong when the Impulse unexpectedly recovered from its long fall toward the ocean. They began to be truly nervous when it destroyed the Zamza-Zah... and now that fear turned to utter terror at the realization of what was coming for them.

The Earth Forces had long feared the color red, in the form of the Crimson Tiger; now they had a new fear, in the form of the red-chested Impulse in close-combat configuration. Unable to truly fly in atmosphere without the Force Silhouette that it had just dropped, it was still more than capable of making mighty leaps... and the pair of antiship swords on its back, much like the Schwerht Gewehr blades used by the old Strike and Sword Calamity, merely sealed the premonition of doom.

The way the two blades combined to form a double-ended sword was merely another piece of confirmation.

As soon as Shinn Asuka's intention became clear, the ships of the fleet began firing desperately, but his mind, though full of anger, was also allowing him to push his body to its very limits, granting him perception and reaction far greater than that normally available to him. The Superior Evolutionary Element Destined-factor might not have allowed him to _exceed_ his body's limits... but it certainly pushed him to the very brink.

Impulse's first victim was a _Danilov_-class cruiser, which Shinn literally landed on top of. His double-ended Excalibur spun down, its crimson blade eating through armor, hull, and internal compartments, slicing almost effortlessly through to the keel.

The hapless ship split in half even as Shinn leapt away; its bow blew apart, while the stern sank swiftly beneath the waves.

The next ship, a _Tarawa_-class carrier, he didn't even bother to land on; he just slashed through its superstructure on his way by, triggering a massive chain reaction which soon turned the entire ship into a raging inferno. A third ship swiftly met the same fate as the first, lopped in half, and a trail of explosions followed in Impulse's wake, for Shinn's mind was full of fire...

Hovering above it all, his machine in mobile armor mode, Kevin Walker mentally shook his head. _You're a hot pilot, Asuka, I'll give you that... but you still fail to see your own greatest weakness. If you don't reign in that temper of yours, someone, someday, is going to take advantage of it and kill you. It might even be me, if you ever make the mistake of attacking me again... or if you _ever_ try to hurt Cagalli._

That last was a guaranteed death sentence as far as he was concerned. Estranged though they might now be, Cagalli Yula Athha still meant a great deal to him... and he would kill _anyone_ who threatened her.

Kevin had sworn that long ago, to himself and to Cagalli's fallen father.

A click sounded within his skull, and his attention returned to the present as the quantum radio in his left mastoid process came to life. _"I think the fighting's over now, Kevin,"_ Murrue told him. _"Impulse certainly seems to be finishing them off... so you can probably return to base now."_

"Agreed. Returning to Avalon Base."

The last embers of the Earth Alliance naval fleet began to die out, quenched by the all-consuming sea,, as Impulse returned to _Minerva_'s deck.

Above it all, MBF-M1000B Nemesis came about in the air, fired its main thrusters, and quietly faded from view.

* * *

For the first time in over two years, Athrun Zala sat in the cockpit of a ZAFT mobile suit, wearing a ZAFT flightsuit, as an official member of ZAFT. _Well, FAITH, technically,_ he amended to himself, beginning ZGMF-X23S Savior's startup procedures. _Still, FAITH members _are_ drawn from ZAFT, so technically..._

He thought back to earlier that morning, when he'd met with Durandal again. By then, he'd already donned a ZAFT uniform again...

_Athrun stood before Chairman Durandal, came to attention, and saluted; something he'd not done in years, but still came to him as naturally as breathing._

_Durandal nodded in response, stood, and reached out to pin a wing-like emblem on Athrun's uniform. "Welcome back, Athrun Zala," he said solemnly. "You are now a member of the Fast-Acting Integrated Tactical Headquarters, our special unit. Now you may fight for what you believe, and remain loyal _to_ what you believe in." He stepped back a pace. "I grant you this position not for the sake of ZAFT, or even for the PLANTs themselves, but for the sake of the entire world."_

_"For the sake of a peaceful world," the woman to Durandal's right put in. Brown-haired, with silver eyes, she wore a coal-black uniform, with a peculiar emblem of crossed scythes in the same place where Athrun wore the FAITH insignia. "My name is Arkanian, Athrun Zala. Commander Natalya Ivanova Arkanian... but you may call me Delta." She smiled. "We may end up working together in the future, tovarisch; I, too, am part of a special unit."_

_Athrun's glance at her was wary -he remembered Kevin mentioning the name Arkanian- but despite Kevin's warning, he detected no malice in the woman expression. _Maybe Kevin was just being paranoid,_ he reasoned. _Where ZAFT is concerned, that's not exactly unusual for him... _"A pleasure to meet you, Commander."_

_Arkanian laughed lightly. "Obviously a certain mutual friend of yours has not said much about me, else you'd be more concerned. No matter; we've plenty of time."_

_Durandal cleared his throat, bringing attention back to the matter at hand. "Athrun, I'd like you to rendezvous with the _Minerva,_ once you've returned to Earth. Like the _Archangel_ and _Dominion_ before her, I believe she and her crew can make a great difference in this war... perhaps even bring it to an end before it can reach the hideous heights of the last war."_

_"I'll do that, Sir. And I'll do my best to see to it that the war _does_ end soon," Athrun promised._

_"Savior to launch in thirty seconds,"_ his speakers said, and Athrun forced his mind back to the present. _"Are you ready?"_

He thought back for a moment, on all that had brought him to this point... and what he might soon see, on the battlefield. He somehow doubted Kevin, for one, would stay out of the conflict... and he feared that, with his seeming concern over Commander Arkanian's very existence, they might not always be on the same side this time.

_But Kevin fights for himself, and for Cagalli, above all else,_ Athrun reminds himself. _Idealism is usually foreign to him. He may well disagree with my actions... but I believe this is the right course for me to take._

He took a deep breath. "Athrun Zala, launching!"

* * *

Author's note: _Minerva_ has departed Orb, and been betrayed; and in the battle to escape, Shinn Asuka has revealed an unsuspected capability of his own... while Kevin Walker has made his return to the battlefield at last.

Meanwhile, Athrun Zala has rejoined the organization his father's madness once drove him from... and has, unknowingly, met the one person Kevin Walker acknowledges to be his superior in the art of war...

Hm... not sure if this chapter is early or late, but if it's late, I say only that it takes time to write a chapter of this length. I was not slacking off, I assure you all; the battle merely turned out to be much longer than I expected. At any rate, I'll soon enough be working on Chapter 13, wherein even more ominous -and, I trust, unexpected- things will occur. In the meantime, however, let me know how _this_ chapter was. -Solid Shark


	13. Chapter 13: Angel of Death

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: This chapter may include spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk  
**

* * *

_"The simple fact is that a Destroyer, even if he's a ZAFT or Earth Alliance copy of the original -and I feel sure the Earth Forces have by now acquired a cursory understanding of the technology- is a bloody hard adversary to kill. In many ways, the original twelve are the toughest -it's futile to attempt to disembowel us; we haven't got any- but even one of the new units is a devilishly hard opponent. Our bones are nigh-unbreakable, our skin and muscle toughened to heights man had never before dreamed of, our regenerative capabilities -even without nanites- far greater than a normal man._

_"Some, like myself, also have active defense measures which serve to largely negate projectile weapons; and even if they do penetrate our shields, our bodies are still impossibly durable. However... there are still ways to defeat us._

_"Thrust a sword into my heart, and I'll die only slightly slower than a normal man, assuming neither my nanorepair nor auxiliary cardiovascular systems are operational... and they haven't been since I took an antitank round to the shoulder. Shoot me through the mouth, and the bullet will ricochet around my armored skull and reduce my brain to mush._

_"And if you ever find any of that terrible metal, and forge it into a weapon, even my bones will be but tissue paper before it... as I have cause to know._

_"Ordinarily, because of the scarcity of weapons which can seriously injure us, battles among us tend to degenerate into hand to hand brawls, contests of men granted the power of Titans; under such a terrible expression of physical strength, eventually even we will fall. But that takes time... unless one has the strength of madness. I found that out the day my comrades fell by my hand..._

_"I found that out the day my sister nearly died."_

Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Captain Kevin Walker

* * *

Landing back in Avalon Base's hangar with a feeling of relief, Kevin Walker shifted Nemesis' reactor back into standby mode, disconnected the neural interface from his palm, and popped the hatch.

Kira and the others were waiting for him when he took the ten-meter drop down to the hangar floor; he surmised -correctly- that they'd been watching the battle. "Well," he remarked, pulling his left glove back on -having removed it to better facilitate the neural connection, "that was a fine kettle of fish. Fortunately, _Minerva_ made it out of Orb's vicinity... despite Yuna Seiran's best efforts."

"Oui," Leona agreed. "You still do good work, mon ami; I doubt the Earth Forces will ever again forget _your _name."

"They never did." Kevin shrugged, absently rubbing his scar. "No, my intervention wasn't the most unexpected thing that happened in that battle, I think. I daresay Shinn Asuka's final blitzkrieg attack was far more startling than even my introductory shot."

"I can see that," Kira agreed, frowning. "Kevin... is Shinn what I think he is? The way his skill suddenly improved near the end of the battle..."

"Yes," the super-soldier said quietly. "There's not much doubt that he, too, is a Berserker. I've seen the results of our handiwork too many times, tovarisch; the abrupt change from despair to terrible wrath is something I recall all too well from the war. For that matter, I knew the signs even before then, after the ABADDON experiments into the area. They didn't work very well, but... well, I certainly know the signs." He shook his head. "One thing is for sure: Asuka has a hot temper under there."

"Yes, I saw that," Lacus noted. "Such as when he inexplicably began to attack you..." She met her brother's eyes. "Leona says you killed his family. Is that true?"

Kevin shrugged. "Apparently; I have no idea how it occurred, but Asuka's description leaves effectively no doubt. When I have the time, I'm going to analyze the records of the Battle of Orb, see what went wrong. I doubt I can convince Asuka that it wasn't intentional, but at least _I'll_ feel better."

She gazed at him shrewdly. "And if he tries to attack you again?"

He didn't flinch; he knew exactly what she was implying. "I'll do what I have to. That hotheaded lunatic should never have been allowed in the military with the kind of emotional baggage and lack of self-control that he has; but since they were crazy enough to let him in, it's something I'm going to have to deal with. I don't want to kill him -I've got enough blood on my hands- so I'll use disabling attacks... but if it continues, I'll do what I must." His jade eyes glowed behind his sunglasses. "And if he _ever_ threatens Cagalli, or anyone else close to me, he _will_ die. His attitude on the battlefield is inexcusable as it is; if he takes it that far, oaths I swore long ago will be invoked."

Lacus still looked troubled, but Murrue nodded in understanding. She knew well how seriously this young man took sworn oaths; he'd sworn one to her, two years previously, and acted on it during what he called the "Interregnum" between the wars, after Mu was killed, and took her into his home, where she'd lived ever since.

Yes, if Shinn Asuka ever stepped over that particular line, Murrue Ramius had no doubt Kevin Walker would destroy him in a heartbeat.

If he could...

Andy was evidently thinking along the same lines. "What about his combat ability?" he questioned. "I saw what he did out there, but you were the one in the thick of it. How good would you say he is?"

Kevin shrugged again. "He's good, but he's no Kira Yamato or Athrun Zala. Perhaps up to my level in terms of raw skill, but his temper is his weakness. If he continues to express such rage when confronting me, he'll never have what it takes. Take it from me: if you're going to take vengeance, you have to be cold about it, especially in battle. He doesn't understand that, fails to see how anger clouds one's judgment. One day, it may well get him killed."

* * *

"Impulse is returning aboard ship, Captain," Meyrin Hawke announced. "All enemy forces have been eliminated."

Talia Gladys nodded. "Excellent." She smiled. "I believe we owe our escape to that young pilot; what he just did out there was nothing short of incredible."

"Agreed, Captain," Arthur Trine said wholeheartedly. "Six ships sunk by his hand alone, without even any help from Walker... I doubt even the famed Freedom could do better than that! He deserves a medal for that feat."

"He'll probably get one," Talia noted. "What he did _was_ phenomenal... and the PLANTs are in need of heroes right now." She slowly shook her head. "You know, I'd wondered why Shinn was assigned the Impulse, instead of Rey; as I recall, Rey's test scores were actually somewhat higher, so I wondered if perhaps Chairman Durandal had seen something in Shinn that no one else had. If so, it looks like he was right."

"So it seems," Trine agreed. "That was the best flying I ever saw..."

Behind them, Meyrin cleared her throat. "Excuse me, Captain, but we've just received a message from the Homeland. It seems that we'll be picking up a passenger when we reach Carpentaria; a Special Forces commander named Arkanian will be joining the crew temporarily, to assume special duties."

Trine frowned, puzzled, but Talia sat bolt upright in her chair. "Did you say Arkanian?" she questioned, startled. "Natalya Arkanian?"

Meyrin shrugged. "The message doesn't say, Ma'am."

"Well, as far as I know she was the only Arkanian to ever serve in ZAFT, so..." Talia shook her head. "After all these years... Arkanian..."

Trine looked at her in confusion. "You're familiar with Commander Arkanian, Captain?"

She nodded thoughtfully. "Oh yes, Arthur, I'm familiar with her. I didn't get to know her very well -I wasn't with the unit for very long- but Natalya Ivanova Arkanian is someone you'll find difficult to forget when you meet her. She usually goes by the codename Delta... and she was the primary instructor of the twelve ABADDON subjects."

He inhaled sharply. "A Destroyer? Here?"

"Apparently so. I thought she was dead, myself; certainly _I've_ never heard anything of her since the project ended, five years ago. I suppose she must've just gone into block ops of some kind, and stayed out of view." Talia shook her head. "After all this time... Arkanian..."

What she did not mention to Trine was that she suspected the purpose of the former mercenary's presence. After all, the day's battle had proved conclusively that Kevin Walker had returned to the battlefield once again, operating as the super-soldier he had once been... and only Arkanian was known to be able to keep him in check.

Which suggested Durandal considered Walker enough of a potential threat to have him captured. Or at least, Arkanian thought so; Talia wouldn't have been at all surprised if it turned out the enigmatic woman was operating completely on her own authority. From what she knew of Delta's records -and much of the instructor's personnel jacket had been classified at a level even Talia couldn't access- she was loyal to the cause, but she also had a will of her own, and she wasn't afraid to do what she believed needed to be done, and ask for permission later.

* * *

Shinn Asuka shut down the Core Splendor's systems with mixed emotions. He was glad to be done with the battle... but many things had happened, which he needed to consider. Relief, yes; he was relieved to have survived, and even fought off the attackers. But there was also ambivalence, for he was not certain what had happened to him in the end.

There was also the lingering traces of anger, both at Orb in general and at Kevin Walker in particular. The older pilot had gotten on his nerves from the start, and then he'd told Shinn off over his anger at Orb, saying that whatever _he_ might have been through, Walker had been through worse.

And now, to find out that one of the events the bastard had so easily dismissed had actually been _caused_ by him...!

_I will have my revenge,_ Shinn promised himself. _As Walker has avenged himself on so many others, I will be the one to bring him down. I just need to find a way past that mobile suit's advantages; without that, even the Black Asp is only an average pilot..._

Popping the hatch at last, he was met by his mechanic friends, Vino in the lead. "Great job out there, Shinn!" he congratulated with a grin. "I've never seen anything like... Hey, are you okay?" he interrupted himself, concerned. "You look..."

Shinn quickly shook his head. "It's nothing, Vino. Nothing you need to worry about. But... thanks." The last he meant sincerely; he knew all too well what it was to be completely alone in the world, and the support of friends was valuable...

"He's right, though," Lunamaria commented, walking over with Rey. "What you did out there... what happened to you, anyway?"

"I'm not sure," Shinn admitted, heading for the hangar's exit. "I... was just so angry at the Orb fleet, and at Walker... and then suddenly my mind went clear, like I could see exactly what I needed to do to defeat the enemy. I... don't really know how to describe it..."

"It was impressive, whatever it was," Rey told him. "I can't think of any ZAFT pilot who could do better; it's possible that not even the Freedom could've surpassed you."

Behind them, the obsidian-haired "mechanic" using the name Kyle Alexander watched them leave. _Is that what you people really think?_ Alec King wondered. _Anger will only carry you so far, Asuka; take it from me, and from all the knowledge of the art of war that Delta imparted to us. And as for the Freedom... you obviously haven't looked carefully enough at the records. He's beyond even you... and if you think it's only the mobile suit that makes my old boss so dangerous, then you've clearly no idea of his potential. Not that anyone does..._

He sighed. Five years had passed, bringing with them another meeting between himself and the Hydra, and yet his feelings about the man were still so very mixed. Alec hadn't lost all respect for him; when dealing with a man proven to be so dangerous, respect was a must if you wanted to survive. He also believed that Kevin Walker was a better man than Shinn, particularly where his temper was concerned...

_But he's also the man who killed my sister, just as he killed Asuka's family, and Luna's and Meyrin's sister. He has more blood on his hands than any soldier I've ever known... how does he feel about that? Does he still remember Rachel at all, or is he just trying to cover up his past sins? No... that's not really fair. He knows what he did... and it may take him longer to forgive himself than it will take me to forgive him._

He frowned then, thinking of another comrade from the past... and as if conjured by his thoughts, his mastoid radio implant abruptly came to life. _"Hey, Alec,"_ a voice said. _"You hear me?"_

Alec sighed in relief. "Loud and clear, Tessa," he said under his breath. "...I wasn't sure you were still alive, after the stunt you pulled during the attack on the PLANTs."

A chuckle came over the link. _"Yeah, I'll admit that wasn't my brightest move. But yes, I'm alive; still recovering in a medical facility, but alive. Can't tell you much about what I'm up to right now -frankly, I don't trust Delta anymore, and she _could_ be listening in- but I can tell you I'm going to be involved in something... interesting soon. Anyway,"_ Tessa went on, _"how are things on your end? I just heard that _Minerva_ had some action today."_

"You can say that again. The Earth Forces jumped us just outside of Orb, and Orb itself betrayed us. Fortunately, our machines were all intact, so we were able to launch a counterattack... and even Kevin showed up, flying what seems to be a heavily-upgraded version of the old Stormhawk."

The Gorgon whistled. _"So... Hydra _has_ taken a hand again. Maybe my cryptic messages to him got him thinking, after all. That's good... I think. Any idea what he's going to do?"_

"He doesn't seem interested in fighting ZAFT at the moment," Alec replied, "if that's what you're thinking. He seemed more interested in frying any Earth Forces unit he could find. Apparently he's letting his grudge against ZAFT lapse for awhile, while he focuses all his energies on zapping the Earth Alliance."

_"Huh; that's interesting. Unfortunately..."_ Tessa's voice turned grim. _"Unfortunately, he may not be so kind to ZAFT much longer; and he may not be the only one in trouble. According to my information, Case Ragnarok was initiated after the fall of the Project... and was never rescinded. I have reason to believe that Delta is preparing to enforce it, should Kevin fail to do things her way. Moreover, I'm even more at risk, for reasons I'd best not disclose at this time."_

He shook his head minutely. "Case Ragnarok... I should've known. Take care of yourself, Tessa; the unit's had too many casualties as it is."

_"And Kevin? Do you still hate him?"_

Alec hesitated. "I'm... not sure," he admitted. "If you'd asked me two months ago, I would've said yes. But now... it's harder to keep perspective after meeting him for the first time in five years... and I don't know what Rachel would've thought."

_"Yes, you do,"_ Tessa said gently. _"They loved each other, Alec; Rachel would've understood why Kevin did what he did... and you know she'd never have wanted her brother to kill her boyfriend over that."_

He sighed. "Yeah. Maybe I do..."

* * *

Right cross. Back fist. Roundhouse kick. Neck chop. Claw stab...

A succession of training dummies went flying to pieces, and Kevin Walker continued to demolish them in a whirlwind of fists and feet, running through a punishing martial arts training regime. He fought against targets made of steel, but they fell before his blows as easily as tinfoil.

He was in a gym located within Avalon Base, several levels beneath the mansion; he'd come here often, during the Interregnum, to practice his skills; now he was here to bring his once-powerful body back to its full capacity. Over the past two years, his body had lost its edge... and without remaining in peak condition, his cybernetics would tear his body apart.

For this, Kevin had doffed jacket, gloves, and even t-shirt as he fought his stationary opponents; he had no desire to destroy any of it in the midst of mere exercise. _Of course, it isn't "mere" exercise at all, is it..._

Another dummy fell to the rapid hammer blows of the Continuous Gem Bombardment, battered beyond recognition, and he swept around to plant his right fist into another's face with a punishing uppercut. _"If you want to train the mind, you must also train the body,"_ he remembered Arkanian telling him. _"The reverse also holds true; your mind and body alike must be operating at peak performance if you are to survive on the battlefield. Remember that, and you cyborgs will stay alive."_

Kevin's eyes flared brighter for a moment at the recollection. If there was any word he hated, it was cyborg; it was crude, less than entirely accurate, and, in his opinion, demeaning. He was far more than a cybernetic organism. The word cyborg implied crudely bolting metal onto flesh, resulting in hideous monstrosities straight out of mid-twentieth century science fiction novels. It implied limbs and organs replaced wholesale by powerful but crude bionics, of hulking, ponderous bodies.

He was different. His right arm and part of his chest had been replaced, as had the right side of his face, but that was due solely to injury. Most of his digestive tract had been removed, but had not been replaced by cybernetics; rather their functions had been redirected, with unnecessary portions taken away to make room for several devices integral to his systems... and his survival.

The Hydra was not a crude cyborg with mechanical replacements all over his body. He was a masterpiece of flesh combined with metal, biological _augmented_ by machine, not superceded. A perfect melding of man and machine... and yet one more reason he was bleeding off stress by destroying stainless steel dummies.

That was, perhaps, the true reason he hated being called a cyborg. Often he wondered, now, about what he truly was. His body mutated before birth to the very limits of what could still be called human; that mutated body further altered by cybernetic implants years later, as part of a horrific super-soldier program...

Kevin's left hand flashed out now, gripped a dummy by the neck, and flung it away like it were made of tin and not steel. His right was even more powerful, but even his left hand was far, far beyond a normal man's strength.

_After all this... can I still be considered... human?_

That was a question that bothered him more and more, particularly in light of the injuries he'd suffered in recent years. Where did the man end, and the machine begin? Was there even a difference anymore... or had the mechanical overwhelmed the biological? The simple fact was that he could no longer recall what it was like to _not_ have the burdens of his own past on his shoulders, to not know the smell of blood and death... to not feel the weight of metal within his body. Even now, parts of his memory were clouded, and perhaps would always be...

It was about then that Kevin perceived he was being observed, and paused in his whirl of training.

Murrue Ramius leaned against the wall near the gym's entrance, watching her oath-brother take out his frustration on the hapless dummies. She'd come down with the intent of informing him that the date for the formal signing of the treaty had been announced, only to find him here, engaging in what seemed to be a combination of training and stress relief.

She actually found the sight more than a little startling; never before had she seen him without the trademark black shirt, at the least. Intellectually, of course, she'd known what lay beneath. Kevin had spoken often enough, in times past, of the scars ABADDON had left on his body. But this... It seemed that his torso was one mass of intricate scar patterns, covering the powerful muscles his shirt and jacket usually hid. All along his back and chest, and down his left arm, the scars of the brutal torture ran deep... and the metal plate covering part of his right side, providing the joint for the mechanical arm, was perhaps even more startling.

Part scar tissue and part intricate mechanical replacement, it was clear simply from the sight of Kevin's body that none of his grim stories of his past were exaggerations. Indeed, it appeared likely that he'd left out much of the tale; an old burn mark was etched into his back, looking to be the relic of some kind of explosion. The slash of a sharp blade cut across the older scars on his left shoulder...

"You really have seen a lot, haven't you," she murmured. "More than you've said..."

"Yes." Kevin's enhanced hearing had easily detected her words. "The burn comes from a street battle in Dnepropetrovsk; that slash I picked up in China, from a combat knife. There are a few others from that time, as well, though most are from my earliest days at ABADDON."

Murrue nodded. "No wonder you're troubled."

He slowly shook his head. "There's more to it than that, Murrue. Old memories... most of them dark... Shinn Asuka calls me a murderer, you know that?"

"I did," she acknowledged. "I also gather from what Leona said that you had no idea you'd killed his family until very recently; what happened there wasn't your fault."

"Maybe. But the simple fact is... once upon a time, he might've been right." Kevin raised his cybernetic fist, idly flexing it. "That time on the run... I didn't really worry about ZAFT. They had no idea I was still alive, so my vengeance against them remained unsated for a long time. But Blue Cosmos... they killed my mother, tried to kill my father, and set innumerable bloodhounds on _me._ I hunted them whenever I could, even if they had not picked up my scent." He glanced over his shoulder at her. "Have you never wondered why I refuse to take prisoners?"

"Well, yes," Murrue admitted warily. "It's crossed my mind from time to time, but I assumed you had your reasons."

"I do," he informed her. "I'm honestly not sure what I'd do to prisoners... because once upon a time, I was... very rough with those I interrogated. I never reached quite the depths Leona did, but then I didn't have to _watch_ my parents die. I never, _ever_ targeted families, or those whose connection to Blue Cosmos was unknowing. Nonetheless... those I _did_ capture did not enjoy the experience, and not one of them ever survived."

She nodded slowly. "I'd... always suspected it was something like that. I've known you for a long time now, Kevin, and I know there are places in your soul not even Cagalli is allowed to enter. From the first time we met, I knew you were capable of great violence, and when I started to learn about your past, I suspected you were far less restrained in earlier years." She tilted her head. "That's something else I've always wondered about, though. Kira's told me enough to know that you lived reasonably peacefully on Heliopolis... but I've never understood why you so suddenly mellowed. That was a year or more before you even remembered Cagalli _existed,_ so it couldn't have been that..."

Kevin walked over to a bench, where he'd left his gear, and began to pull his shirt back on. "I was tired, Murrue, very tired. After so long on the run, after so much killing and death, I just... ran out of steam. Then, somehow or other, Kira's parents learned I was still around, if not what I was doing, and offered to take me up to Heliopolis to stay with them. That... gave me a chance to put my bloody past behind me, if only for a little while; it also reunited me with one of the few friends I'd ever had, up to that point. The only one, besides Athrun, whom I could even remember at the time, and Athrun's whereabouts I had no knowledge of then.."

"So you used some of your own training to push it all into the back of your mind," Murrue mused. "You lived out the next year as a simple college student, I remember..." She chuckled. "I have to wonder how your professors would've reacted if they'd known one of their students was not only an Orb aristocrat, but also one of the most dangerous people who ever lived?"

Kevin managed a smile of his own. "They might have been just a little concerned," he allowed. "Even you had heard of the Crimson Tiger, as I recall; I doubt any professor would've been happy to find the name behind the legend in his class." Sighing, he pulled on his trademark black leather jacket, leaving it unzipped. "It really was nice, though, to have some peace, after all the killing..."

"I'm sure," she said softly. "I'm curious, though: what did you tell Kira's parents, about your family?"

"The truth," he answered, drawing on his gloves. "That they were killed in the sabotage of the Porta Panama mass driver. I just didn't happen to mention their names, that's all... which is just as well, since Dad is still alive after all..."

Murrue nodded thoughtfully. "I don't suppose you have any idea yet what he's attempting?"

"Not precisely," Kevin said heavily, sitting on the bench. "I can draw some inferences, though, from the fact of my creation as well as a few other pieces of circumstantial evidence." He waved a hand, motioning around at the base itself. "This facility, for example, has had a number of different names over the years; my mother once told me that every generation gave it a new codename. The original designation was apparently 'Base Alpha-Two', which presumably meant something in the nomenclature of the Reconstruction War era. In my grandfather's time, it was called Olympus... and my father designated it Dol Guldur."

"Dol... Guldur?" she repeated, frowning.

"Old literature," he explained. "Not as well-remembered as it deserves; the Reconstruction War is probably at fault there, as well. Suffice it to say that it was a stronghold of a great evil... but only that evil's lesser stronghold. My father has always been a subtle man, Murrue; in battle I surpass him, but in intrigue he is still my superior. This, however... _this_ I'm afraid I can understand all too well. It would certainly explain the sudden increase in weapons stockpiling that took place after he succeeded my grandfather, and perhaps even the damage to _Amaterasu."_

Murrue's eyes narrowed. "The lesser stronghold... You think he was after something even greater. Your father was -is, I should say- an ambitious man, from everything you've said of him... and you were created to be soldier." She met his gaze. "You think your father was planning a coup d'etat, using you and Stormhawk as his trump cards."

"Very likely," Kevin confirmed. "It's the only explanation that makes any sense. I'm still not entirely sure why Mike was created, except perhaps as a backup, but it's pretty clear to me that he intended to use me, as Stormhawk's pilot, to accomplish his goals, whatever they might have been. It's also likely that he was working on Stormhawk's design before I was even born; he's farsighted enough to have recognized the combat potential of mobile suits long before most others did. So he would've set to work designing both Stormhawk and me... and then waited fifteen or sixteen years for me to mature."

Murrue shivered, "The cold-blooded calculation involved in that is inhuman..."

"Agreed." His eyes were jade ice; clearly, all respect he might once have had for his father had long since vanished... leaving only rage at the death of his mother, the murder of his cousin... and his own twisted genesis. "The only thing I _don't_ understand is why he gave up. Oh, it's true that I wouldn't go along with such a plan... but he abandoned that path before I could've made such a decision, or so I judge from how he steered me toward politics rather than war, for as long as I could remember."

She thought about that. "I think... that there was one thing he couldn't predict," she said finally. "It's fairly obvious that he never realized you were going to school with the son of his colleague, Hibiki... but even if he didn't, I think he recognized that Kira's influence, and Athrun's, had 'corrupted' you. After meeting them, especially at such a young age, you lost all trace of the feeling that your high birth made you superior to 'commoners'. That very fact would've made you useless to him in his initial plan."

Kevin titled his head. "You know," he said slowly, "you may just have a point. But in that case... why didn't he activate Snake Eater sooner? I'm well aware now that he's ruthless enough to simply dispose of those who are no longer useful to him."

"I think there are two reasons for that," Murrue answered. "First of all, it's clear to me that, though she must've known about the Mendel experiments in general -since you, too, were a product of the artificial womb- your mother Irena had no knowledge of his plan. I think she really did love you, Kevin, and your father couldn't possibly have killed you as long as she was still alive. And also..." Her expression became troubled. "I think maybe he saw another possibility. You told me that you and Cagalli have known each other all your lives... and that it was around that time that people began to whisper about the two of you."

His cybernetic fist clenched. _That miserable vnyebrachnyi!_ "In other words," he said in a low voice, "he may have been thinking that, if control of Orb couldn't be achieved by force, then I might solve the problem by one day _marrying_ into power."

"It's what the Seirans are trying, isn't it?" she said reasonably. "And given how well it's working even for those slimy creeps, I'd think your father could see that what was happening between you two -and quite willingly, unlike the current match- and take advantage of it for himself." She met his gaze unflinchingly. "Can you be certain that, had ABADDON not intervened, you wouldn't have been susceptible to his influence?"

Kevin sighed. "No. No, I can't. I've always been reasonably firm in my own opinions, and self-confident... but as I said, my father is a very subtle man. Before ABADDON molded me, I might well have fallen under his influence without even realizing it... and that influence would extend through me to Cagalli." His jade eyes darkened for a moment. "It appears that... Blue Cosmos may have done Orb a favor, in the end. Perhaps ZAFT, as well; had I not gone missing for so long, my father might've returned earlier, and tried to make use of me. Now..."

"Now your only concern is that he's trying to _kill_ you," Murrue noted, "and that sort of thing you've been dealing with for a long time."

"Not just that," he corrected. "I don't believe he's given up his designs on Orb; if he had, he wouldn't be bothering to kill me, and he wouldn't have murdered Frank." He idly tapped the grip of his holstered revolver. "I'm also much concerned by _Amaterasu_'s condition when Gai Murakumo stumbled on her. It's clear that my father fought a battle from her decks not long after our respective supposed deaths, but even now I've no idea who the enemy was. It's clear Dad erased all of the records before he abandoned ship -presumably to hide his tracks should anyone from Orb ever find the remains- and I have no idea who would even have _wanted_ to attack. Blue Cosmos, maybe, but those were the days before the Earth Alliance was formed, before they sank their moles deep within the military."

"I don't suppose it was a pirate group, or maybe a mercenary force?" she hazarded. "Blue Cosmos might've chartered some group or other to do the job."

"Doesn't add up," he responded. "I've never heard of any pirate group that would be willing to take on an _Izumo, _and the only mercenary groups I know of that could are Gai Murakumo's Serpent Tail and Canard Pars' people, both of which came into existence years after _Amaterasu_ disappeared. No, there's something else in all this, something I'm not seeing... Unfortunately, I'm a soldier, not a spymaster. Frank, I think, was coming near to an answer, but if so, he never had the chance to tell anyone."

"Which may be why your father killed him," Murrue mused. "I can't see what other purpose it would serve... So, no news from Tolle, then?"

"Not yet," Kevin acknowledged. "I'm not expecting him to find out anything about _Amaterasu_ right now, anyway; I had to pull him off the hunt and send him to the PLANTs, after I saw that fake Lacus broadcast."

She nodded in understanding. "What _do_ you plan to do about her, anyway?"

"At the moment, nothing. But that's only because she serves admirably as a decoy for the _real_ Lacus, distracting those who would wish her ill. However..." His eyes were cold as he settled his sunglasses into place. "If she steps over the line, I won't hesitate to eliminate her."

* * *

It was one of many war memorials that stood within Orb; their number was a testament to the courage of Orb's soldiers... and the violence of the Earth Alliance's wrath.

Some of the names on this one were familiar to Cagalli Yula Athha; one of them was her own father's, and also the names of the other members of Orb's government who had perished in the final defense of the nation, nearly three years ago.

The new year had begun, but while it was a time of beginning, Cagalli reflected, the beginnings were sad and wrathful. The man who'd meant the most to her had begun preparations to depart the country completely, in the wake of her decision to accept Yuna Seiran's proposal... and a new war had begun.

_Yes, it's a time of beginnings... but sad ones..._

She remembered all too well what had led to this memorial's existence. The war had at last reached Orb itself in the middle of C.E. 71, nearly three years past now, and the battle that had raged then had been short but brutal. In the end, the courageous defense by Orb's military, and the _Archangel,_ had come to nought... and so that ship, along with Orb's own _Kusanagi,_ had fled for space, carrying with them the heir of Orb and the hope that the sacrifices of that nation would not be in vain.

And as they lifted to the sky, Uzumi Nara Athha, and most of his government, had blown Morgenroete and the Kaguya mass driver sky high... with themselves still inside.

Even now, it was a bitter memory, made all the more so because it was that, among other things, that had left her vulnerable to Yuna Seiran's proposal. Had circumstances been different, she never would have accepted... but now it seemed the only course.

Cagalli still didn't know what had caused Kevin to suddenly grow distant; she could only assume that it had something to do with his encounter with his old instructor, weeks before. If not for the fact that she had never seen him exhibit fear to such an extent that it would bring him to this pass, she would've thought him afraid of something. Yet even so, the only fear he had ever admitted to having was losing those close to him... so what could he...?

Whatever was going on, it had also cost her the last of her bodyguards. Athrun had gone to space over a week earlier, Kevin had become reclusive and had ultimately been dismissed through the Seirans' political maneuvering... and now Leona Colde had resigned, that very morning.

_"This is something that must be done, Lady Cagalli,"__Leona told her, standing in the Chief Representative's office; as had become her custom of late, she wore purely civilian clothing, mostly of black. "What will soon become of Orb is something I cannot endorse, and so I must resign, effective immediately."_

_Cagalli stared at her. "You're leaving, too?" she said; though even to herself, her voice was not as disbelieving as it should have been. "You're my last bodyguard..."_

_"Yuna Seiran and his father would soon have me dismissed anyway," the older woman pointed out calmly. "They even managed to get rid of Kevin; though it was partly because he himself intended that, I have no doubt they could and would do the same with me. Even if they couldn't, however, I would have to leave." Her jade eyes, so like Kevin's own -some said that was because of the melding of his genes with her own- stared hard into Cagalli's. "This is the wrong course for Orb, My Lady, and you should know it."_

_Cagalli looked away. "We don't have much choice," she said, almost in a whisper. "If we reject this treaty, we risk losing everything we fought for two years ago. We risk having Orb burned to the ground again..."_

_"And instead of losing what you fought for by force, you'll throw it away on your own," Leona said scornfully. "But that wasn't exactly what I was talking about. The treaty is terrible, yes... but what you've done to Kevin may be even worse. Not only have you wounded a man you love, a man who has already endured trials you cannot even imagine, but you have set loose the Crimson Tiger upon the world again. Think, perhaps, on what _that_ means for the stability of the world, hm? That man holds grudges until they die of old age, and then has them stuffed and mounted. You can be sure that the first thing he'll do after leaving Orb is resume his mission of destruction against the Earth Alliance."_

_"Then why don't _you_ try and stop him?" Cagalli shot back, temper flaring. "If you're so close to him, why don't you stop him... you even have his DNA!"_

_"Some of it, yes. But it's not my place to do so; you were the only one who could keep him in check, you know. And besides..." Leona's eyes changed, a peculiar look coming into them, which fit with the odd smile that appeared on her face. "Kevin Walker has asked for my help... and quite frankly, I'd sooner see the world in ruins if it makes him happy." Leona turned to leave, but spoke once more as she walked away:_

"_We do things that we regret for the rest of our lives, Your Highness. I hope for your sake that this isn't the one you'll regret till the day you die…" _

The ex-ZAFT soldier's visit had, if anything, made Cagalli even _more_ uneasy; her cryptic words about Kevin having asked for her help hinted that he was forming a conspiracy of some kind, doubtless involving his hidden weapons research.

And her final words... Cagalli honestly didn't know whether to be jealous, or to be glad that there was someone else out there who would care for him, now that she was beyond his reach. She'd feared that, after the death of Rachel Carver, her own departure would leave him forever empty.

_Maybe it won't come to that,_ she thought now. _But I've made sure he'll never want to come back here, haven't I..._

She devoutly hoped it was all worth it. If she'd chosen this course in vain, she would strangle Yuna... and perhaps herself, as well.

A sound off toward the ocean, in the direction of Izanagi, caught Cagalli's ear then, and she turned in time to see a most peculiar sight: though it was hard to see at this distance, it appeared that a tube of some kind had appeared several kilometers out from the island, sticking straight up out of the water...

Her breath caught in her throat. She knew what that had to be, though as far as she knew it had never been tested. Indeed, she'd not known of its existence until after the war, when Kevin reported some of what he'd found in Avalon Base; doubtless that secrecy, and the security measures around Onishi Mansion, were all that had prevented the Earth Forces from finding it during the occupation... "The mass driver," she whispered. "Is he testing it? Or..."

A rumble, more felt than heard, echoed in the very ground beneath her feet, and within moments a shape came hurtling out of the oceanic mass driver. It looked familiar to her, as well it should: the stunted-looking shape of an _Izumo-_class battleship, launching for the sky.

"It's _Amaterasu,"_ Cagalli murmured. "She's repaired... but who's aboard? Surely it's not..." No, it couldn't be; she had some knowledge of Kevin's enhancements, and by her calculations he would not yet be ready to set out. In that case... perhaps Leona Colde, heading off on her own mysterious errand?

Her thoughts were interrupted as a car suddenly pulled up beside her, Yuna Seiran at the wheel. He looked concerned, presumably about her... but as with her, his gaze was directed skyward. _"Amaterasu,"_ he murmured. "So, he completed repairs, and sent her out... I wonder what that man is up to..." He shook himself, looking back at Cagalli. "I've been looking for you," he told her now. "You know, you shouldn't be out here unguarded; you never know when danger may come to you."

"At the moment, I don't exactly _have_ any guards," she said, more to herself than to him, as she climbed into the car. "They've all gone..."

Somehow, though, she didn't really expect Yuna to shed any tears over the departures of those three soldiers. They were all known Coordinators, after all, and all three had at one time or another served in ZAFT, two of them with special forces units of unsavory reputation.

As they drove away, back toward Orb's capital, Cagalli finally turned to Yuna and asked, rather bluntly, "Just what is it you want from me, Yuna? I know about your talk of uniting the country and everything, but there has to be more to it than that."

He shrugged, not taking his eyes off the road. "You might want to work on your manners a bit, if you're going to continue to lead this country... Anyway, is it really so hard to believe that I have your best interests in mind? I swore on your father's grave that I'd protect you, you know."

_You're not the first person to say that... and the first person is gone, thanks to you._

"Also," Yuna went on, oblivious to her thoughts, "you can't afford to be involved with Baron Onishi; or even with your other two 'bodyguards'. We can't have the people thinking that you're risking Orb by associating yourself with Coordinators."

"In case you've forgotten, Yuna," Cagalli said carefully, "_I'm_ a Coordinator, too."

"True," he conceded, "but that's not widely known. Onishi, on the other hand, _is_ openly known to be one, and is known to have contact with people of... dubious reputation. And you and I both know that he doesn't even think of himself as an Orb citizen anymore; he cares more for his own missions than for anyone else. Nor does it help that Dino has gone to the PLANTs, and not returned... and Leona Colde's resemblance to Onishi, especially in the eyes, isn't a good sign, either." He glanced briefly at Cagalli. "Just how _is_ she related to him, anyway? Some illegitimate daughter of the old baron that we never heard about?"

She snorted. "Hardly. Kevin may well have illegitimate siblings for all we know, but she's not one of them. Some kind of gene therapy ZAFT performed, apparently; and she's not exactly pleased with them over it. She's not a ZAFT sympathizer, if that's what you're worried about."

"That much was fairly obvious," Yuna admitted grudgingly. "I have my problems with Onishi, but I know full well he'd never have dealings with ZAFT or ZAFT agents. It's his temper I'm more worried about."

"Whatever they might be doing now," Cagalli said in a low voice, "they're still my friends, you know."

He shook his head. "You still don't quite understand, I see... Look, Cagalli, will you still dare to use your family name if you abandon your responsibilities as Chief Representative? Because that's what continued association with those people, especially Onishi, would be. You know as well as I do that he's going to jeopardize our relations with the other members of the new World Security Treaty Organization, with his irrational hate of the Earth Alliance. In fact, he already has, with that reckless intervention in the _Minerva_ incident... which, I might add, was technically illegal. I have no doubt that he'll continue to act in such a manner. Don't you agree?"

She looked away. Much as she hated to admit it -and much though she might disagree with his interpretation of the events- it was true. Kevin Walker had little love for ZAFT, but at this point he had even less for the Earth Alliance.

As long as the new conflict lasted, he would be on the frontlines, a soldier without a country, fighting to utterly annihilate his foe.

* * *

"Well," Andy murmured, stirring a cup of coffee, "I guess it's begun. The 'World Security Treaty Organization' is about to be formed."

"Which makes all signatories de facto members of the Earth Alliance," Murrue noted, sipping a cup of her own. "ZAFT's going to be hard-pressed, fighting against the entire world."

"They won't be fighting alone," Kevin asserted, leaning against the wall, taking an idle sip from his cup. "I fear that most of my military might lies in utter destruction, which isn't exactly what the situation calls for -unless I want to crack to the planet open or something- but Prometheus is neither weak nor allied with the Earth Forces. I've sent Leona on ahead with _Amaterasu;_ at Artemis she'll begin her new training, receive her augmentation, and then take her own place in Prometheus. If need be, she can probably lead my space forces herself, should it come to open war in orbit again."

Andy raised an eyebrow, amused. "Sounds like 'Prometheus' has stuck to your entire outfit, Racher."

The younger man shrugged. "We had to call it something; even before this latest mess, we weren't exactly Orb forces, after all. Since I already had the Prometheus Unchained project looking into my genetics and Destroyer-based weapons development, and the first of our new ships was given that name, I suppose it was inevitable that someone would finally apply that name to the group as a whole."

"And now you'll fight the entire world," Murrue murmured. "All by yourself..."

"It wouldn't be the first time," Kevin pointed out. "At least this time, I have more than my own body to serve my purpose." He met her eyes solemnly. "I'm leaving tomorrow, you know. And it may be a long time before I come back... if ever."

She nodded somberly. "I know, Brother. Just... be careful, wherever you go."

"I always am."

Andy cleared his throat. "Not to spoil the moment or anything... but Racher's kind of got a point about clearing out of here. With that treaty signed, it's only a matter of time before Kira, Lacus, and I have to leave. They won't be kind to Coordinators when everything's started."

"Heading for the PLANTs?" Kevin said shrewdly.

His mentor nodded. "Probably. I know you still don't trust them, but it should be fine for us; we're not important enough for them to worry about anymore."

The youth nodded back. "Good luck, then... Voyevoda." Addressed as it was to Andy Waltfeld, it was not quite as high an accolade as it was to Arkanian, but it was a gesture of respect nonetheless.

The Desert Tiger now turned to Murrue. "You could come with us, you know," he suggested. "If they find out who you are, it may not be healthy for you, either."

Murrue smiled wistfully. "It's tempting, I'll admit... but frankly, Andy, I'd just like to sit this one out. I'd rather spend my days in a place where I can finally have some peace, even if it's not with him..."

Kevin touched her shoulder, knowing who his sworn sister was referring to. "I understand, Sis," he said quietly. "And if you ever change your mind -or have it changed for you- remember that you've got a place with us. You ever need help, just send word, and Prometheus will charge to your aid."

She smiled; it wasn't often that something brought out the "Fencing Prince" in him, but when it did happen, she found his phrasing fascinating. "I _will_ remember that, Kevin... and thank you."

* * *

Night fell over Orb, and its guardians slept, knowing that war was not yet upon them... but one figure yet remained alert, watching over the home of the man the soldier had sworn to aid. And that soldier's enhanced senses detected something no unaided human would.

Hyperion's mouth tightened behind the mask, as the thermal signatures appeared on the helmet's visor. _A special ops team,_ the soldier thought, watching them begin to move through the night toward Onishi Mansion. _And... no, that's impossible! That technology does not exist anymore, save only in the few relics of our unit that survive!_

Yet there was no mistaking the distinctive thermal, radioactive, and electromagnetic traces of active implants... implants of the sort that only ABADDON soldiers bore.

_Query target implants,_ Hyperion commanded, the augmentation within the soldier's body receiving instructions at the speed of thought. _Identify targets; remain in passive mode. Prepare to activate implant com, and ready communications jamming._

_"Implant signatures unknown,"_ the computer voice murmured in Hyperion's mind. _"Augmentation parameters not in database; technology resembles that of the Archetype, but slightly more advanced. Analysis concludes capabilities at midpoint between Archetype and final production model."_

The soldier swore softly. Had it been just the dozen or so normal intruders, Hydra could undoubtedly have handled it himself. Even them with a single Destroyer of this type would probably have resulted in victory... but against _two,_ when Kevin clearly had no idea of their presence, the soldier's certainty wavered.

_Only one choice left,_ Hyperion thought. _I hope he's up to this..._

The soldier's com implant came to life. "Hydra, this is Hyperion. Delta Zulu. I say again, Delta Zulu. Delta Zulu!"

* * *

Kevin Walker was dreaming. This was not unusual; his past, brutal as it was, often came back to him in his sleep. And now, the long-ago nightmares of the final hours of Project ABADDON had begun to return again...

This time, though, it was interrupted, before it could reach the moment of catastrophe. _"Hydra, this is Hyperion. Delta Zulu. I say again, Delta Zulu. Delta Zulu!"_

His sleep-fogged mind, still clouded by the nightmare, could not at first make sense of the words. _Huh...? What's that sound..._

_"Wake up, idiot!"_ the voice snapped. _"Do you hear me, Hydra? Delta Zulu!"_

Kevin's eyes snapped open, and trained instinct had him crouched on the floor next to his bed, revolver in hand, before he was fully awake. "This is Hydra," he responded, bringing up his transmitter. "Sitrep, stat."

_"Between one and two dozen hostiles approaching your location,"_ Hyperion answered, a twinge of relief in the synthesized voice. _"They appear to be armed with standard ZAFT infiltration and assassination gear; some of it looks to be leftover Next-Generation Special Forces equipment. Also, be aware that at least two augments are heading your way, identities unknown."_

"Bozhe moi," Kevin hissed under his breath. "Arkanian, I'll kill you for this!" He twitched his head, bringing himself back to the moment; the problem with thoughts of revenge was that they clouded his thinking at awkward moments sometimes. "Message received, Hyperion. Hydra, out."

Moving with the silent speed that characterized his kind, he was suddenly pressed up against the wall next to his bedroom door, Colt Single Action Army held in a ready hand. (_Kira,_) he said silently, calling over the one channel he _knew_ no one could intercept, (_wake up. We've got trouble._)

There was a groggy stirring on the other end. (_...Kevin? What's... going on...?_)

(_Someone's trying to kill us, that's what's going on,_) the super-soldier replied. (_Just got a call from Hyperion; though what he's doing here, I have no idea. Anyway, he sent a "Delta Zulu" message. That's Destroyer talk for "Danger Zone", which means if we don't work fast, we may all be dead._)

Kira was suddenly wide awake. (_An assassination team? Coming here? Why?_)

(_How should _I_ know? But I'm pretty sure they're ZAFT; Hyperion also tells me that two unknown Destroyers are with them._) Kevin's mental voice was grim. (_That almost certainly means Delta is sick of waiting for my answer, and has decided to enforce Case Ragnarok. Kira, there's no time: wake up the others, and get everyone -and I mean _everyone-_ into Avalon. Do it now!_)

(_Okay, I'm on it._) From the link's other end, Kevin had the impression of a flurry of sudden activity. (_What about you?_)

(_I'm going to remind these bastards why ZAFT and the Earth Forces alike have feared me for so long._) Then the super-soldier's tone turned very firm. (_Kira, if you see one of those two Destroyers -and they should stick out like moths at a wasp convention; you know how we move- _do not_ engage. You see them, you run. You understand me?_)

(_If you say so,_) Kira said reluctantly. (_But I don't like the idea of you taking them on all by yourself._)

Kevin snorted silently. (_Don't try to be a hero, Kira; heroes end up dead. Listen to me: you are no match for one of them. You're not a ground soldier, and you are _not_ up to their physical level. You try to fight them, and you'll be dead before you realize they even moved._)

To that, Kira had no answer. In these times, only the Destroyers themselves had true understanding of their own capabilities; even the Prometheus researchers were far behind the soldiers themselves in understanding those powers.

Which meant that, of all the residents within Onishi Mansion, though several were veterans of combat, only one could hope to take on both of their augmented foes at once.

(_Murrue and Andy are awake,_) Kira said after several moments. (_We'll hold off the regular troops until everyone else is in the shelters. Meryl's here, too; and Lacus is leading the children and the others into the base elevator._)

Kevin opened his door, stepped cautiously out into the hallway of the bedroom wing, and nodded to Kira as he came out another door. "All right," he said now, in a low voice. "They won't send in the Destroyers immediately; not if they operate the way Delta always used to. That gives us time to evac, and take out the normal troops. You head for the library with Andy, Murrue, and Meryl; that's where they're likely to enter first. I'll take the entrance foyer, where another group will probably infiltrate. They'll most likely send the Destroyers to the same location."

Kira nodded. "Got it. Be careful, Kevin."

"You too, Kira." The two parted, heading in different directions, and Kevin raised his voice. "Security systems to Omega Status," he told the mansion's computers. "Initiate action against all unknowns in library, entrance foyer, and exterior walls."

"Understood," the central computer -far less bright than Max, but efficient at its job- replied. "Initiating action."

Kevin Walker could not guarantee that his home would not be taken, but he could and would ensure that the enemy would be hurt in the process.

* * *

A dozen infiltrators, led by another man wearing unpowered body armor, crept toward the outer walls of the massive edifice Kevin Walker called home. Well armed and armored, covered from hidden places nearby by several top of the line mobile suits, they and those who had sent them believed they would be more than up to the task. And if not, the second team preparing to enter from another point would undoubtedly finish the mission.

A storm was beginning to gather above them; they presumed this would merely aid their mission, providing them with the cover or rain. It seemed as if the elements themselves were aiding in the night's deeds.

"Remember the mission objective," the point man murmured. "Our primary targets are Lacus Clyne and the Hydra; secondary objectives are to determine whether or not underground facilities exist, gain access if they do, and retrieve any examples of technology created by the rumored 'Prometheus' program." He glanced back at his teammates. "Remember, if you are unable to quickly neutralize Hydra, signal either myself or Meerkat; if his systems are indeed fully online, it would be reckless for you to continue the attack yourselves."

"Understood," his second-in-command acknowledged, echoed by the others in the team. "Beginning infiltration."

The point man now stood back; his involvement would only occur if specific circumstances obtained inside. Otherwise, his superiors preferred that he and his colleague -leading Team Two- remained completely unknown. The existence of their unit was still top secret.

The new team leader motioned toward the main entrance ahead of them, and his demolitions specialist moved forward, kneeling in front of the massive oak doors. So far, secrecy had served them well; now it's time was past, for only explosives were likely to defeat the countermeasures the Hydra doubtless had in place.

A few moments' work with a block of plastic explosive, and the entry charge was set. The demolitions expert retreated to join his comrades, raised his detonator, and whispered, "Fire in the hole."

The resulting explosion blasted the door off its hinges, incinerating whole chunks of it, and the way was clear. The dozen assassins rushed into the breach, standard automatic rifles at the ready as they entered the building with textbook precision. Their gazes, augmented by nightvision equipment, swept around the entrance foyer, and found... nothing.

The team leader's rifle swept warily around the room. "Something isn't right here," he whispered. "Where is everyone? That should've woken up the whole-"

A scream cut him off, its effect aided by the accompanying flash of azure light, and he spun around just in time to see one of his men lose his head to a beam that speared out of the east wall, fired from a hidden emitter. The commando's foot had touched a seemingly-innocuous floorboard, and now he paid for his clumsiness with his life.

"Booby traps," the demolitions man hissed. "This entire place is full of them! Reading targeting systems all over the place, Sir; if we're not more careful, we're all going to die."

"Perceptive man," a low voice uttered within the darkness. "Except for one thing: no matter how cautious you are, every single one of you is going to die."

Outside, the storm had begun, and now lightning began to flash outside the foyer's windows. In one of those flashes, a black-clad man was suddenly visible, standing at the top of the stairs leading to the mansion's second floor. And in that moment of brightness, another flash occurred, this one conjured by the barrel of the revolver held in the man's right hand.

Another commando went down, his head blown apart by the forty-five caliber bullet, and a third quickly raised his rifle. _That bastard!_ he thought, squeezing the trigger.

A burst of gunfire ripped into the walls and ceiling, but none touched Kevin as he leapt agilely away, landing on the walkway set midway between floor and ceiling. "Hold your fire!" the team leader barked, following his target with his eyes. "Remember the briefing; bullets don't do much to the likes of him!"

"You've been well-trained," Kevin acknowledged, holstering his revolver. "And you received a more thorough briefing than I would've expected. At least you've confirmed who sent you... but it's all for naught, comrade, because the moment you entered this building, you left the world you knew behind. You're in _my_ domain now, and I take no prisoners."

He leapt again, this time down to the floor, and the commandoes reacted swiftly, dropping their rifles in favor of combat knives or martial arts stances. They had been hand-picked for this mission; aside from the one, instinctive potshot at their target, they knew better than to rely on firearms. Against his kind, blades and hand to hand were the only way to succeed.

What followed was an eerie event, darkness and silence broken by the sound of thunder and the bright flash of lightning. To the soldiers of ZAFT, who still remembered the tales -and the hard facts- of the Crimson Tiger's implacable wrath against their organization, Kevin Walker yet remained, in many ways, a symbol of the darkness itself; the bogeyman, with strength and speed far beyond that of normal men.

Which was not to say that they did not try to fight regardless... nor that they were completely ineffective at it.

The instant Kevin landed, a knife drove toward his throat, forcing him to sidestep quickly, lashing out with his left hand. The commando holding the knife grunted in anguish as the blow went home against his shoulder, driving all feeling from his right arm, but managed to leap back regardless.

A flicker of lightning, and he suddenly fell without even time to scream, as a blade materialized in a slash, arcing through his neck. Another flash, body and head fell away, and the super-soldier was gone again.

_It's like a nightmare,_ the commando team leader thought, glancing around desperately. Kevin kept appearing from the shadows and then vanishing again, almost as though he was toying with them... _That bastard! Ugh, this _is_ like some kind of nightmare..._

A shout went up behind him, and he turned in time to see one of his men succeed in catching hold of Kevin's arm. He was moving so fast that even Coordinators had trouble keeping track of him, and he was heavier than the soldier was used to, but he nonetheless managed to catch Kevin in the middle of a thrust, use his momentum against him, and toss him across the room.

"Nice try," the sandy-haired youth grunted, twisting impossibly to land on his feet, "but you're out of your league." A flash of lightning, a flicker of reflected light from his right hand, and the man who'd thrown him gasped in anguish, clutching at the blade of the small throwing knife that had appeared in his throat.

_I tried for so long to deny my own existence,_ Kevin thought, twisting nimbly to one side as another man threw a kick at him. _I pretended to be a simply nobleman, a politician... I thought that if I kept to the role long enough, I would _become_ the role... but after all this time it's simply too late. I'm no longer a malleable clay; I've become hardened stone, molded into the shape my father and Oracle desired._

A blade sang past his head, grazing his hair, and he leapt back another pace, his right arm snapping up to deflect. The blade punched out of his sleeve again, materializing as nanomachines altered the outermost layer of his cybernetic arm, and the assassin gasped as his combat knife's blade snapped off, defeated by the incredibly tough integral weapon.

_I am what I am._

Even as the broken blade fell, Kevin's weapon came down and drove forward, punching through the commando's body armor like a knife through butter, stabbing a half dozen times in quick succession before he let the body fall.

_There are those who become strong enough in battle, who spend long enough on the battlefield, that it is the only path open to them. Unsuited to purely civilian careers, it is battle that defines them... I suppose I am one such man. But if that is so, I can accept that. As long as there are people there will always be war... and as long as there is war, I will be needed._

Kevin leapt over a knife thrust, grunted as another blade punched through his jacket to make a deep cut along his ribs, and landed between the two adversaries. His left hand drove a knife into the back of the man behind him, while his right arm slashed upwards, his arm blade eviscerating the man who'd cut him.

_I am become Death, the Destroyer of worlds..._

"I am the Angel of Death," he stated, glowing eyes sweeping across his remaining five adversaries. "All those who cross me... perish. As all of you will this night..."

And that was when the south wall exploded.

* * *

"Judging from that explosion, they're inside," Meryl Steiglitz muttered, yanking a ZAFT assault rifle out of a wall compartment in the library. "I hope the Captain can hold his own against them..."

"Hyperion reported that there were only a couple of dozen of them," Murrue reminded the younger woman, holding a pistol as she kept watch over one of the entrances. "I doubt that few Coordinators could defeat Kevin that easily."

"He's not invincible," Meryl reminded her. "And there _are_ a couple of augmented soldiers with them. And besides, like you said, that information _did_ come from Hyperion. I don't trust him, whatever the Captain may think; deus ex machina types always make me nervous."

Murrue shook her head. "If Hyperion wanted Kevin dead, he could've done it back at Armory One, or during the colony drop. I think he's legitimate, however strange his motivations may seem." She glanced toward the library's main door then, as Kira ran quietly in. "How's Lacus, Kira?"

"She just got the last of the orphans into the shelter," he answered, "along with my parents and Reverend Malchio." As with Murrue and other members of the Four Ships Alliance, Reverend Malchio had come to the mansion, with his orphans; and in no small part because of their taking him in years earlier, Kevin had invited Kira's adoptive parents to live there, as well. "I tried to convince her to get to safety, too, but she refused until the rest of us are safe."

"That may be a little while," Andy said grimly, holding up his own pistol; like the weapon Kevin carried in a shoulder holster, it was a four-barreled Metal Storm handgun. "I don't know if you heard it, but there was an explosion a minute ago; some of them must already be in-"

Without any warning at all, the library's east wall exploded inward, taking an entire bookcase with it... and on the heels of the explosion, a dozen armed men charged into the room, firing automatic rifles.

"Nichevo!" Meryl hissed, unconsciously imitating her Captain, and threw herself to one side. "They're already here!" Rolling upright, she came to a kneeling position and aimed her own rifle, firing back at the assassins.

Where Kevin's battle was silent darkness punctuated by flashes and screams, this skirmish was all light and noise, bullets flying everywhere and muzzle flashes illuminating the room. Come what may, this would swift and brutal.

Murrue flung herself flat, pistol already barking in her hands. _This reminds me of Heliopolis,_ she thought distantly, watching one of the attackers go down with a hole in his gut. _That was the first -and till now the only- time I fought like this..._

Kira had reacted with reflexes faster than any of them, rolling behind a tough oak desk which proved nearly impervious to bullets. Hunkering down behind it, he fired back with a pistol of his own. "Who are these guys!" he called over the sounds of gunfire. "Why are they here?"

"They're ZAFT!" Meryl shouted back. "I remember them from when I- Ahh!" Cursing vilely under her breath, she rolled desperately to one side, leaving drops of blood from a graze to her face behind. "These bastards," she hissed. "I've had just about _enough_ of you!" Within her eyes, something began to change...

"If they're ZAFT," Andy grunted, daring to remain on his feet as he fired, "then they're not like the ZAFT I knew. Except for special projects like ABADDON and the NGSF, they didn't _do_ things like this."

Before anyone could respond to his assertion, one of the attackers managed to get close... and plunge a knife into Andy's left forearm.

The Desert Tiger was not intimidated. In fact, he smiled. "Bad move, kid," he advised the soldier... and triggered the dormant function that lay within his arm.

The assassin's face barely had time to register surprise before the large-caliber weapon built into Andy's cybernetic left arm went off, blasting him backward with a hole in his chest the size of a watermelon. Even as he fell, though, another attacker fired off a burst, and Andy was forced to take cover behind a fallen bookcase.

Time had ceased to matter; whether the battle had raged for seconds, minutes, or centuries was something none of them could say. None of the defenders were truly trained for this kind of battle, though they held their own... and so it appeared likely to stay for an eternity. Another assassin went down, the back of his skull blown out, but they were all in the room now, and it was only a matter of time-

_"Enough!"_

Murrue's head snapped around, and her eyes widened. Meryl was the one who'd uttered the cry of frustration and anger... and before the eyes of her friends, _Dominion_'s helmswoman began to change. Her face lengthened, growing forward into a beak; feathers sprouted, and a pair of long, graceful wings grew from her back.

**"I've had enough of this,"**Meryl uttered, letting go of her rifle. Her wings pumped once, twice, and lifted her into the air above the library floor. **"You bastards should've learned from dealing with the Captain: you don't mess with those of the Blood if you want to survive!"**

Kira stared at her. "She's... a zoanthrope? Like Kevin?" _But that doesn't make sense,_ his mind insisted. _If she were, Kevin would've felt it... right?_ As far as he knew, the mental techniques that blocked Kevin's empathy didn't stop him from detecting the blood of a zoanthrope.

Nonetheless, there was no mistaking the physical transformation Meryl had undergone, as she activated latent genes within her body. Her metamorphosis was more extreme than Kevin's, but it was a difference of degree, not kind, based on the physical differences between their respective forms.

It was obvious that the commandos had never expected to see anything like it; indeed, it was likely none of them had ever even seen a zoanthrope, save perhaps recorded imagery of one of the Crimson Tiger's rampages against Blue Cosmos. Their pre-mission training had prepared them to fight a cyborg; it had _not_ prepared them to fight a woman who altered her own body into the form of a humanoid eagle.

It was probably that confusion that kept Meryl alive, Murrue reflected moments later. The screeching dive that resulted in a commando being hurled out through a window -one looking out over the cliff, no less- indicated skill, but her movements were more hesitant than Murrue would've expected. _She's not used to this,_ she realized. _It's something she hasn't done much..._

Indeed, though Meryl dove again, and delivered a terrible slash to another assassin's chest with her beak, she immediately retreated, and dropped back behind the desk Kira was using for cover. "Blast it," she hissed, drawing a pistol from a holster on her belt. "I haven't done that since I was ten years old; miracle I still remembered how to fly. Not enough endurance to last in a fight like this...

"It'll be enough," Andy assured her, and risked leaving cover long enough to fire off another round, catching his target in the throat. "There aren't many of them le-"

An explosion off toward the entrance foyer sent all on both sides back into cover.

* * *

The moment the explosion went off, Kevin leapt backwards several meters, and realized he'd made a slight miscalculation. He'd expected the Destroyers to be cautious, and enter one at a time; in terms of the situation that actually existed, it would've been suicidal, but on the basis of the information he believed they had about his own capabilities, it would've been logical.

Unfortunately, it appeared the enemy disagreed.

They both wore the distinctive, form-fitting black of Destroyer unpowered body armor; they also wore swords at their waists, long and slightly curved. Kevin identified them as being of the katana style, and realized that Arkanian -assuming she was indeed the one who'd sent them- had been a step ahead of him.

They'd bother with the blades only if they expected that his augmentation was already fully active.

"It's him," one of them noted.

"The deserter," his companion agreed.

"Do we proceed?"

"Yes. He is still..."

"Only human."

"Hiya, fellas," Kevin said amiably, hiding his unease behind a mocking smile. "Is this a social call? You should've called ahead; I'd have gotten out the wine."

"Quiet, Hydra," the first Destroyer said dismissively. "I'm Mongoose, and this is Meerkat; and this is no social call."

"A couple of mongeese, eh?" Kevin grinned. "Snake eaters, in other words. Someone must really not like me right now."

"That's mongooses," Meerkat said irritably, completely unaware that the insults were actually a part of his target's plan. "Now shut up and die, traitor. Case Ragnarok is in effect, and we won't stop until you're dead."

"Fascinating." The sandy-haired soldier didn't lose the smile. "I guess Arkanian really was serious. Only one problem: you're hunting a snake, not the Grim Reaper. I've shed the skin of Hydra... the title I acknowledge now is Angel of Death."

Mongoose snorted, and drew his blade. "Delta warned us you were good at word games, 'Angel of Death'; but it won't help you." His lips curled in a snarl. "And do you really want to be called by the name that goes with that title? I believe the name of the Angel of Death _was_ 'Azrael'."

Kevin's eyes narrowed. "A pathetic copy of our true form... but an educated one, I'll grant you that."

Meerkat shook his head, drawing his own blade. "You won't think us pathetic in a few moments, Hydra. We're better than you seem to think."

"Is that a fact? Then I guess I'd better go all out, myself." Something in the jade eyes flickered. "Increase augmentation output... to one hundred percent."

It wasn't something Kevin did lightly. Against the normal soldiers he'd faced minutes earlier, he hadn't used that much strength; against an unaugmented human, it was unnecessary. Moreover, he had reason to believe that it was actively dangerous. To date, he had only set his output at maximum in battles with other Destroyers, or critical situations involving Blue Cosmos... and he'd _never_ done it for an extended period of time. The ABADDON program hadn't lasted long enough for the testing cycle to be completed, so Kevin was honestly unsure of whether or not a human body -even one as mutated as his- could even survive the full capabilities of cybernetic augmentation for more than a few minutes at a time.

_Guess it's time for me to find out... the hard way._

Kevin's right leg swivelled around behind him, and he settled into a left-handed stance, fists closed. From between the fingers of his left hand, gleaming, fifteen-centimeter claws extended through slits in his gloves; it had been a long time since he used them -that was why he'd omitted them from his latest-model right arm- but they were still lethally effective. "Let's dance!"

Mongoose instantly sprang into motion, lunging forward, the sword in his hand blurring as it swept out. The five surviving assassins had all retreated to the far corners of the room; there was nothing to get in the way of the titanic clash that was to follow.

Kevin ducked beneath the slash, flipped backward, and landed on his hands, then leapt forward, left hand slashing down. Mongoose sidestepped, allowing Meerkat's katana to make the intercept... and the blade sliced right through the claws, just beyond Kevin's knuckles.

Disbelieving, Kevin managed to alter his trajectory to land in an awkward roll between the two adversaries, and came to his feet several meters away. _How did he _do_ that? Those claws were made of-_

Mongoose smiled mockingly. "Surprised, Hydra? We _were_ briefed on your capabilities, you know; we didn't exactly come unprepared." He lifted his blade for emphasis, and for the first time Kevin noted that its edge seemed to blur even in stillness.

"A high-frequency assault blade," the sandy-haired solider said with grudging respect. "Guess I'm not the only one resurrecting our old technology. Still, if you people had been _really_ smart, you would've armed all your people with them, instead of just the two of you. Then you might've stood a better chance of defeating me."

"We're all we need to take you down," Meerkat sneered, and leapt before he'd even finished speaking.

Kevin saw him coming, and raised his right hand to parry the blow. The enemy Destroyer, unconcerned -having proof that his weapon would damage even the tough metal that composed the Hydra's bones- fully expected to slice through the entire length of Kevin's arm, depriving him of his better fighting arm... but it was his turn for a surprise.

The katana stopped dead against the palm, biting through the leather glove and the uppermost layer beneath, but no more.

Kevin's left fist came up then, smashing into Meerkat's jaw. The ZAFT Destroyer, completely off-balance thanks to the interception of his strike, was catapulted backwards, slamming through the foyer's staircase.

Mongoose stared in disbelief. "How did you-!"

"Did you actually think I'd fall to such a paltry trick?" Kevin demanded, casting aside his glove. "Obviously Delta is behind the times: I'm a little more mechanical these days that she remembers." He flexed the cybernetic hand, and activated the sixty-centimeter arm blade again. "You're a strong man... just what I'd expect from a new generation of Destroyers. But you're still green, and I am the Angel of Death." The blade swung up, protecting his face. "Shall we go again?"

"Let's."

The snarled word came from behind; Meerkat had recovered faster than Kevin had expected, and he body-checked the ex-ZAFT soldier. Hit by a force far greater than a normal human could've used on him, Kevin flew sideways, crashing through the room's north wall, leaving a dent of splintered wood in the floor of the next room as he nearly went through it, and slammed to a halt against an oven; he'd been knocked into the kitchen, and almost senseless.

"Hm..." he murmured, feeling momentarily like a punch-drunk fighter, "upgrades..." His cortical implant calculated furiously in the wake of the blow, and bare moments later he was on-balance again.

Meerkat lunged for him again, blade slicing down, but Kevin's arm snapped up, stopping the high-frequency blade cold -though his own weapon had splinters fly off on contact- and his left fist lashed out, catching the ZAFT Destroyer in the chin.

He went sailing through the air as though shot from a linear catapult, and Mongoose was forced to duck as his compatriot's out of control body slammed through the wall above his head. "Delta was right to warn us about how good you were, Hydra," he snarled, advancing cautiously. "I guess we underestimated you. But you know as well as we do that your body won't hold out forever; you keep pushing yourself like that, and it'll destroy you."

"I don't care."

The ZAFT soldier was brought up short by the reply, though he continued to walk forward. "What do you mean, you don't care? Have you lost all sense, Hydra?"

Kevin picked up a kitchen knife from the debris, pressed it against his fractured blade, and watched impassively as the metal disappeared within the cybernetic appendage, seeming to melt into the damaged areas. "No," he said calmly, bringing his blade back to guard position, "I haven't lost my senses. I just know something you don't: strength without someone to protect is but a fool's strength, which will lead only to your own destruction."

"If there are a creators," Mongoose said with a snort, "then a society must also have destroyers. A balance, as Delta taught us... and, I'm sure, taught you, as well."

"You're missing the point, Mongoose. Or maybe it's more fair to say that Delta misses the point." Kevin's jade eyes glowed softly in the dimness, visible even when another flash of lightning filled the room. "I abandoned her teachings, you see. Not the physical, but the moral. I chose to fight for my own cause, with no regard for the PLANTs or even my own homeland... but that cause is still primarily the defense of another. I revenge myself upon others, but in the end, my loyalty, my devotion, and my power to protect are all for one person." He shook his head, even as Meerkat hauled himself back to his feet. "Until you understand what I'm telling you, you'll be nothing more than dogs of the military."

"You're just wasting breath, Hydra-" Mongoose began, but Meerkat cut him off.

"Enough, Mongoose! Can't you see he's just stalling? That's what he does: he keeps his opponents wrapped up in talk, all the while planning-"

"Perceptive of you," Kevin observed, and launched himself forward.

A normal man could not have intercepted his charge; a Coordinator might've seen the blur of his passage in time to at least move away, while a Natural wouldn't have even seen him move, but neither could possibly _stop_ his rushing thrust.

But Mongoose and Meerkat, though their systems were inferior to those of the original twelve, were Destroyers nonetheless.

Kevin was fighting a dangerous battle. He had, at one time, defeated or killed his entire team of fully-augmented Destroyers, all by himself... but he had been in zoanthrope form then, with Berserker capabilities in play, and the strength of madness upon him. Moreover, his comrades had simply been unable to believe that death would come from their own leader.

Today, he had only his augmentation to aid him, and his two opponents were fully aware of what was going on.

His seemingly insane thrust was partially successful; Mongoose twisted to one side, but Kevin's blade grazed his right arm anyway. At the same time, Meerkat used the opportunity to sidestep, and swing _around_ Kevin... and when he came around to the front again, he thrust his katana through Kevin's abdomen, just below the stomach.

For a moment, Kevin simply stood there, looking down at the blade that impaled him. Then... he began to smile.

* * *

"They don't seem to have been able to spread out much," Murrue noted, moving cautiously through Onishi Mansion's hallways. "The rest must all be where Kevin is."

"I think they are," Kira said, frowning in concentration. "He's fighting right now, I know that... at least one Destroyer, I think. Maybe two."

"I hope he's all right," Lacus whispered. "With the situation as it is..."

"Yeah," Andy agreed grimly. "This hasn't exactly been a good night."

The four of them, with Meryl bringing up the rear, were now on their way to find the rest of the intruders. They'd managed to deal with the attack on the library, though Murrue had taken a graze to the left shoulder in the process, and now they intended to help Kevin secure the rest of the grounds.

They'd run into Lacus along the way, and, to their dismay -particularly Kira's- she'd insisted on coming along. Kira had reminded her that, unlike the rest of them, she had _no_ training in combat at all, but she had simply said that she couldn't just go to the shelter and be safe when she knew her brother was risking his life for them, all alone.

It was an attitude Kira dearly wished she didn't have, considering the danger, but it certainly went far to prove that she and Kevin were of the same blood.

Andy abruptly raised a hand. "Wait," he said under his breath. "Look."

Murrue followed his gaze, and her mouth tightened. Five armed commandos were clustered in the doorway leading to the entrance foyer; presumably the only reason they were still alive was because Kevin had other problems at that particular moment.

And now one of them heard or sensed something, and turned to look in their direction.

Instantly, Murrue was in motion, knowing there wasn't a moment to waste. "No prisoners!" she hissed to Kira, reminding him of how dire the situation was, and then she was among them.

There was no room or time for her to raise her pistol. Instead, she dropped the weapon, grabbed the arm of the nearest commando before he could react, and pulled him close. Her left arm maintained its hold on his right, and her own right arm wrapped around his throat. With a heave, she flipped him over her shoulder and slammed him into the floor.

The loud _snap_ told her the man's neck had broken, just as she'd intended.

Meryl went for a more artistic approach. Along the way, she'd retrieved one of Kevin's old rapiers, and now she drew it from its scabbard in one smooth, practiced motion. She'd never been up to the level of Orb's "Fencing Prince", but she was still one of the best in the world, and she knew exactly how to use the slender blade's reach to her advantage.

She parried a clumsy knife thrust from her target, allowing it slide harmlessly by, and flicked the rapier out in a deceptively casual motion. Its blade, kept as lethally sharp as that of any in Kevin's collection, slid neatly through the man's chest, its point punching effortlessly through armor that would've stopped bullets with ease, and lanced deep into his heart.

The man was dead, even if he didn't yet know it; with the blood pumping out of the wound, he'd die in mere seconds. The left three more, and Meryl's blade was in sudden, swift motion again, lightly flicking across to the next assassin, who made a gurgling sound as the flesh over his throat parted.

The other two fell almost simultaneously, felled by twin headshots from Andy and Kira. _I'm sorry,_ Kira thought, silently apologizing, _but you left me no choice._ It was a lesson he'd found hard to accept, but Kevin had eventually convinced him of a few hard, uncaring facts: disabling a soldier on the ground is neither as bloodless nor as simple as it is to render a mobile suit helpless; also, Kira didn't have the training in ground combat that might've allowed Kevin himself to risk it.

And perhaps most importantly of all, it was simply too great a chance to take... especially when the five combat-trained adults who called the mansion home were all that stood between helpless children and death at the hands of murderous assassins.

Murrue sighed, checking over the bodies on the floor. "That's all of them," she said regretfully. "All the regular troops, anyway. Why they'd attack this place, though, and why they'd keep fighting even after they had to know they'd lost-"

"Kevin!"

Kira's gaze snapped up, hearing Lacus' cry, and his eyes widened at the sight of the entrance foyer. Three separate walls had large holes in them, the front door was gone, and part of the central staircase had been ruined. And in the center of it all, three figures stood. One of them had a sword raised as though for a killing blow.

The second had his own blade buried so deep in third's gut that the point was sticking out the other side.

The first man's head snapped around at the sound Lacus had made. "The primary target," he noted, and his muscles tensed as though preparing for a leap... a leap which was never made.

"Idiots," Kevin said clearly, staring down at the blade through his abdomen. "Trying to disembowel me, are you? Obviously your information is less than complete... or you'd know I don't _have_ any these days."

Meerkat had a moment to look very surprised, before Kevin's right hand shot out, palm slamming into the ZAFT soldier's chest. He went flying, pulling the katana with him, and Kevin's leg promptly scythed through Mongoose's, knocking him over.

"Idiots," he said again, breathing hard. "It'll take more than that... to give me a fatal wound..."

"Kevin!" Murrue called. "Are you-"

"Stay back!" Kevin interrupted, pressing his left hand to his wound. "You can't do anything here; not against them. Let me handle this."

"But your wounds-"

"Nothing down there but machinery," he said, shaking his head. "I told you, most of my digestive tract was removed. All I've got to worry about is the blood loss, and my augmentation will take care of that soon enough." Though his regenerative nanotechnology had been offline ever since taking an antitank bullet to the shoulder, his internal equipment did still retain the capability to close wounds; and for all that this one had been deep, its entry and exit slits had actually been quite small.

Kevin now straightened, and returned his attention to Mongoose, who had sprung back to his feet several meters away. Like Kevin, the ZAFT operative was starting to look a little beat up, with blood on his face and several areas of his armor, but he was still functional. Destroyers were durable, to the point where even their own kind had difficulty killing them.

"Shall we continue where we left off?" Kevin said now. "Try a little harder this time... or just lie down and die. I don't really care which, because in the end, neither of you are going to survive this."

"Don't get cocky, Hydra!" Mongoose snapped, and leapt forward.

Murrue couldn't make out exactly what happened in the next few moments. It was clear from the sound of metal-on-metal that the two super-soldiers were exchanging blows with their blades, but all she could see was a tangling black blur.

Then she sensed Kira tensing behind her. _"Lacus, look out!"_

Murrue's gaze snapped around, her eyes wide, as the second ZAFT Destroyer, forgotten by Kevin in the heat of the moment, came charging out of the rubble Kevin's last hit had smashed him into. Kira was already firing desperately, but the bullets ignored Meerkat completely, flying off in all directions as he raced toward his "primary target"... and thrust.

Lacus gasped, eyes wide with shock, as the blade pierced her stomach. "Ah!"

Behind Kevin Walker's eyes, a jade seed burst.

"Get clear, Hydra!" a new voice shouted, even as Kevin spun away from Mongoose. "Protect the girl; I've got Mongoose!"

He needed to encouragement, and even Kira recoiled as Kevin stalked toward them. "You _bastard,"_ he seethed, gaze locked on the smirking Meerkat, who now withdrew his blade from Lacus. "If you think... that you're going to survive _that..._ then you're delusional, you pathetic _insect!"_

Mongoose, slowly realizing that the situation had changed, quickly regained his bearings -having lost them when Kevin shoved him- and started to race toward his comrade... but he stopped abruptly when a figure seemed to materialize out of the dusty air in front of him.

"Going somewhere?" Hyperion questioned, synthesized voice deceptively pleasant. "Sorry, but I can't let you interfere anymore." The armored soldier's right arm came up, supported by the left, and the cannon muzzle on the end of the arm was glowing.

The last thing ABADDON Phase Two Operative Mongoose ever saw was an azure flash, as a hurricane of rapid-fire particle beams shredded him.

At the same moment, Kevin reached Meerkat, who had raised his katana in the confident expectation of being able to stop the rage-fueled charge. Unfortunately, he knew essentially nothing of the significance of Kevin's dilated pupils, and so didn't realize the true danger he was in.

Kevin didn't waste time with any kind of dramatics, or mocking, or anything but focused violence. His arm blade simply slid beneath Meerkat's guard, then whipped back up again... cutting through Meerkat's wrists in the process. Then the blade retracted back into Kevin's arm, and he reached out for the ZAFT Destroyer.

Unable to fend the enraged soldier off, Meerkat could only stare in horror, futilely launching a kick, as the self-proclaimed Angel of Death lifted him off his feet, slammed him down onto his knee... and pressed down, hard.

There were several moments of titanic stress, and an audible groaning sound Murrue found more than a little disturbing, and then a brief scream from Meerkat... before his spine snapped, killing him as he had just attempted -possibly successfully- to kill Lacus Clyne.

It had all taken perhaps three seconds, perhaps less, and Kira caught Lacus before she could hit the floor, her attackers already dead. "Lacus...? Lacus! Say something!"

"I'm... still here," Lacus managed. "But... it hurts..."

"Get her down to the base infirmary," Kevin said, slowly standing and tossing aside Meerkat's mangled body._ "Now."_

"I've got her," Murrue offered, and took Lacus from Kira. The girl was still breathing... but the wound was deep, and unlike Kevin, all her organs were still the original issue.

"She should be okay," Kevin reassured his friend. "If she gets prompt medical attention, that is; but the base has Prometheus gear, which is the best in the world." He finally turned around, eyes colder than space itself. "Kira... I know how you normally feel about killing. But understand something: don't try to get in my way. Whoever sent them is going to _die,_ swiftly, and without any mercy at all."

Kira met his gaze, and felt a matching fury of his own, beyond any he'd felt since the end of the war. "Don't worry, Kevin," he said, his voice almost unrecognizable even to himself. "This time... I agree with you."

The super-soldier's gaze snapped over to the armored soldier who'd helped them out. "What took you so long, Hyperion?"

Hyperion's head hung. "I'm sorry, Kevin," the soldier said quietly. "I should've been faster; but I was checking the area first, to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Obviously, I should've waited."

Kevin took a deep breath. "No. You did the right thing. But..." His eyes were hard with purpose. "You still call me your commander, and you act like you mean it. If you do, then do this for me: find out who ordered this atrocity."

Hyperion nodded sharply. "With pleasure, Kevin. I'll be in touch."

"Good." Kevin shook his head then, frowning. "Now I've... got to... get to Nemesis..." Trailing off, his legs gave way, and he collapsed to the floor.

"Kevin!" Kira ran to his side. "Kevin, are you-"

"Don't worry about him," Hyperion advised. "He just needs rest... and probably a few large meals, when he wakes up. He just snapped a Destroyer in half, in case you didn't notice; and our skeletons are reinforced with the same metal they make CGUE battle armor out of. You don't break a spine like _that_ without a _lot_ of energy expenditure. I'm actually surprised he stayed on his feet long enough to give those orders." The soldier's visor turned toward Andy and Meryl. "You two, Desert Tiger and Bird Lady, I suggest you get him somewhere a little less exposed; he's not going to do you anymore good tonight."

"Right," Andy agreed. "Meryl, you take his left arm; I've got the right."

"Yeah." As they bent to their task, Meryl shook her head. "Bird Lady?" she repeated under her breath.

"I caught your little stunt with my implant scanners," Hyperion informed her, augmented ears catching the words. "Believe me, a zoanthrope has a distinctive signature when you know what you're looking for." The soldier turned back to Kira. "Yamato, I think you'd better take to the air."

Kira frowned. "Why? And how? I can't fly Nemesis, and there's nothing else-"

"Freedom's still intact too, kid," Andy called over his shoulder. "Tucked away in Avalon's hangars; and the door is keyed to your retinal pattern. If you need to launch, go ahead and do it."

"And I think it would be a very good idea," Hyperion concurred. "It looks like that was the last of their ground force, but it seems they had contingency plans: half a dozen of ZAFT's new ASH amphibious mobile suits. Against certain high-performance machines, they'd be clay pigeons, but they'll level this building quite nicely." The armored visor fixed on the young man's face, and Kira had the eerie feeling that the eyes behind the helmet were looking very intently at him. "So what's your choice, Kira Yamato? Stay and die... or go out there and fight? It's a choice we must all make eventually..."

At the start of tonight's battle, he might've hesitated; even after seeing the battle between Kevin and his former instructor's minions, he might've been reluctant... but not after what had just happened to Lacus.

"I'm going out there," Kira Yamato said firmly. "There's no more time to hesitate, or hold back. It's the only way to protect my friends... and if I have to take this battle even beyond here, to the war, I'll do what I have to do."

He'd rested for two long years, convinced that his days on the battlefield were over. Now he knew they weren't... but he'd do what he had to. For his friends, for his family, and for the entire world.

Because there were things in the world that he couldn't protect without fighting.

* * *

Author's note: In the aftermath of Orb's betrayal, _Minerva_ makes her way to Carpentaria Base for repairs and new orders... and to pick up a passenger, as well...

Meanwhile, Leona Colde leaves for space to become another of Kevin Walker's most capable subordinates... even as a battle rages below, between the old ABADDON and the new, as someone tries to silence both Lacus Clyne and the man once called Hydra. The repercussions of this event will ripple throughout the entire war...

Hm; not sure if this is early or late, but if it's late, all I can say is that it turned out to be about a third again as long as I expected. However, I think I at least provided a decent amount of action, and perhaps a couple of surprises, as well. Next chapter will have even more of both, I think... but in the meantime, let me know how this one was. -Solid Shark


	14. Chapter 14: In Fury Born

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: This chapter may include spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk  
**

* * *

_"Normally, I have a very high opinion of my adopted nation; Orb is certainly a far better place than my homeland of France -in the heart of the Eurasian Federation- or my first adopted home in the PLANTs, where Patrick Zala rose to power a little too easily, and in the long run, nearly destroyed the world._

_"I found Orb very much to my tastes when I first set foot on its soil, after defecting to their forces at Second Jachin. It truly was a land of peace, despite the crater where the Morgenroete factory had once been, and the wreckage of the Kaguya mass driver. Unlike so many places I've visited, it lacked the prejudice against Coordinators that was so much a part of much of Earth... just as it lacked the prejudice against _Naturals_ which allowed Zala to get as far as he did in the PLANTs._

_"That quality alone made it an excellent place for me to begin my own healing, from my deeds of revenge against those who murdered my parents -deeds which surpassed even those of my good friend Kevin, which makes me regret them all the more- and the loss of my own unit, at Alaska and Jachin Due. Here, I could begin anew, in the more peaceful role of one of the Chief Representative's bodyguards, after turning down an offer to join their military as one of their elite pilots; I'd had my fill of war back then. That was how I became acquainted with the man whose genes made the Next-Generation Special Forces as effective as they were: the Legendary Soldier himself, Kevin Walker._

_"So when I learned that Cagalli Yula Athha had consented to marry that insufferable, cowardly _buffoon_ Yuna Roma Seiran, I wasn't exactly happy and the knowledge that a treaty which would effectively make Orb a part of the Earth Alliance itself would be ratified, I felt truly betrayed. Looking back, I think that was the only time that I had truly hated Cagalli Yula Attha for what she had done._

_"This is why I fight: because a country betrayed me, proving itself little better than the nations I fled in the past... and because it drove a brave and honorable woman to betray one of my best friends. That is why... my loyalty is, like that of many others, given to Captain Kevin Walker, of Prometheus, not Baron Kevin Onishi, nobleman of Orb. Like him, in the wake of that betrayal... my loyalty is only to those I can trust._

_"My loyalty is to my friends, not to any nation."_

Contribution made by Prometheus Fleet Lieutenant Commander Leona Colde, in Chapter 13 of _The Tragic Spiral of War, _by Captain Kevin Walker

* * *

Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, codename Delta, frowned at her computer screen. "Tiamat," she called, speaking to one of the Destroyers relaxing in the ABADDON base lounge, "where are Mongoose and Meerkat? According to the computers, they're not even in the base."

Tiamat shrugged, glancing up briefly from his chess match with Fafnir. "No idea, Commander; all I know is that Chairman Durandal contacted the base a couple days ago, saying he had new orders. Mongoose and Meerkat were gone within hours. Some kind of special assignment, I guess."

Arkanian's frown deepened. _A special assignment... and he didn't bother to clear it with me first? I know I wasn't exactly accessible for a couple of days, but he should have at least contacted me by radio..._

The thought of the radio gave her an idea, and she activated her own mastoid quantum-radio implant. _"Connect with Destroyer sensory linkages,"_ she commanded her systems. _"Find and link with Special Operative Mongoose; audio only."_ No sense distracting him, if he was busy... but she _did_ want to know what he was busy _with._

Instantly, the receiver in Delta's mastoid began delivering the data directly into her brain. It wasn't perfect -it seemed as though someone was trying, with some success, to jam the signal at the source- but she caught several words immediately. _"...the title I acknowledge now... Angel of Death..."_

Arkanian stiffened. "Angel of Death?" she repeated under her breath. "That's Kevin's voice... what is going on down there?"

She could then hear several minutes of fighting, interspersed with choice remarks from her operatives and their opponent, who -judging from voice and the amount of furniture-breaking noises in the background- had to be Kevin Walker. It seemed to be a vicious battle, though she could only glean a few details from it... and then she distinctly heard a shout in the background. _"Lacus!"_

Delta's blood ran cold then, realizing _exactly_ what was going on... and then even more sounds, as though the jamming had suddenly cleared up, came through with painful clarity. _"Get clear, Hydra! Protect the girl; I've got Mongoose!"_

_That voice... it's from a Destroyer voice synthesizer. And that means... the one Kevin called Hyperion._

_"Going somewhere? Sorry, but I can't let you interfere anymore."_

The radio link automatically switched over to Meerkat an instant later; the sound of heavy energy discharge made it clear exactly why.

And when the scream echoed from the radio an instant after that, following by a sickening _snap,_ Arkanian understood what had happened. _All_ of what had happened.

"We've just lost Meerkat and Mongoose," she announced grimly, standing.

Fafnir's head snapped up. "What?" he said, startled from his usual Zen-like concentration on the chess game. "How?"

"Chairman Durandal's a blithering idiot," Arkanian answered bitterly. "You can be assured I won't let him forget_ this_ ill-conceived act of lunacy. What he did was send an assassination team, led by our two comrades, to eliminate the real Lacus Clyne, along with Hydra."

Draken shook his head. "But I thought we were supposed to be trying to _recruit_ Hydra, not kill him."

"That's the idea," she agreed, "at least for now; and the good Chairman ought to have realized that even if he succeeded at one of his objectives, he wouldn't succeed at the other... and Kevin Walker would react very, very badly to the death of Lacus Clyne. In fact," she added unhappily, "she may _be_ dead; Meerkat certainly wounded her, and if she's dead, it would explain what happened to him a few seconds later. If the sound was any indication, he was literally broken in half, which means Hydra's Berserker circuits activated."

Fenrir's expression tightened, and the others didn't react much better. Unlike the original twelve Destroyers, they were all fully briefed on Hydra's Berserker circuits; they knew that he himself was almost certainly unaware of them, that they only activated under _very_ specific circumstances... and that the last known time they'd been active, the original Project ABADDON had been wiped out by a single man.

"I'm surprise even _he_ survived it," Tiamat said in a low voice. "Five years ago it contributed to his death; he probably wouldn't have lived another half hour even if he _hadn't_ blown himself up."

"Indeed," Arkanian agreed. "However, in this case he had them active only long enough to break Meerkat; I have no doubt he's unconscious after expending that much energy, but I'm also quite certain he's still alive. Which is a good thing," she added grimly. "Hopefully, Clyne survived as well; though even if she did, our 'brilliant' leader has very probably just put Kevin into vengeance mode. It's going to take a lot of work to get him on our side now, if it's possible at all."

"Should we even be bothering?" Wyvern questioned. "After what he's done... shouldn't we just eliminate him before he could do any more damage?"

"No," Delta said firmly. "First of all, ZAFT has done that man enough harm as it is; unless we have no choice at all, we've no right to try to take him out. More importantly... you know what he just did, comrades. Kevin Walker is potentially the most dangerous human being history has ever known; with experience, he could surpass even me. Leaving aside how much difficulty we'd have just trying to kill him... can you even imagine what good he'd do were he on our side once again? No, comrades, this is one man we cannot afford to give up on unless we have no other choice."

"Chairman Durandal seems to disagree," Tiamat pointed out carefully.

She snorted. "Let me handle the Chairman." Suiting words to actions, she activated her implant radio again. "This is Commander Arkanian; I need to schedule a meeting with Chairman Durandal as soon as possible. Yes, I'm sure his schedule is already quite busy, but I'm going to be leaving for Earth later today, and this matter _must_ be handled in person..."

* * *

Descending deep within Avalon Base, Kira Yamato felt a whirl of confused emotions. There was surprise, of course, at the revelation that ZGMF-X10A Freedom still existed; and there was fear for Lacus, after the terrible blow one of the enemy Destroyers had given her. And that fear led to perhaps the strongest emotion of them all... rage.

Kira wasn't accustomed to such terrible, killing rage, a distant corner of his mind reflected as he jogged down corridors toward the Freedom's hangar. The last time he'd felt this way was when his best friend had seemingly killed Tolle Koenig; that rage -mutual rage, since Athrun had blamed _him_ for Nicol Amalfi's death- had led to their nearly killing each other.

Today, that rage was once again in control, and Kira understood at last Kevin's searing, soul-deep hatred of ZAFT and Blue Cosmos. _They hurt her,_ he thought savagely, _and they're _not_ going to get away with it!_

The fact that they'd also tried to kill Kevin -and, from all appearances, nearly succeeded- didn't help Kira's mood any.

At last, he reached the hangar where Murrue had told him Freedom was stored, and quickly punched the access code into the keypad next to the hatch, still moving with a fearsome intensity. He had a feeling Lacus would've been reluctant to let him go out there, he reflected as the hatch slid open, but it wouldn't have stopped him. Even without the killing rage, he'd have gone out there to protect his friends.

_I might've let them live,_ Kira conceded, stepping onto the elevator that would bring him to Freedom's cockpit, _but I _would_ have done it._

Dropping through Freedom's restored hatch -the original having been blown away in the explosion of GENESIS, over two years before- Kira was already planning his strategy. He'd be flying alone, with no support; Hyperion had simply said that the Excalibur's weapons weren't designed for close-in air support in the vicinity of a civilian structure... and that Freedom was unlikely to _need_ any support.

_"They're ASH units,"_ Hyperion had reminded him. _"I don't know if Kevin's given you any details of them -though I'm quite certain Prometheus is aware of them- but they're top of the line amphibious assault mobile suits, so new that they're not even in frontline service yet. Just because they're new, though, doesn't make them a match for the Freedom. Their pilots will not be anywhere near as good as you are, and they're not exactly nuclear powered. Also, as amphibious machines, they won't be all that good on the ground. Freedom will rip them to pieces without a problem, I think."_

On that, Kira was in agreement with the armored soldier.

Almost the moment he powered up Freedom's systems, his radio came alive. _"Are you there, Kira?"_ Murrue asked.

"Yeah," Kira replied, eyes still intent on his preflight check. "...How's Lacus?" He was almost afraid to hear the answer to that question, but he needed to know.

_"She's in a bad way,"_ she said frankly, _"but we think she'll be all right. The wound is deep, but it only damaged her stomach and grazed her liver. I don't fully understand the medical technology down here -it's more of Kevin's Prometheus gear- but it's already going to work on her."_

He sighed in relief. "Thanks, Murrue. I... really needed to hear that."

_"I know."_ Murrue's voice softened. _"But are you still...?"_

"Yes," Kira said flatly. "For one thing, I can't take any chances; not with so many civilians -especially the kids- here, even if they're all down in the shelters. And..." His expression hardened. "I'm beginning to understand Kevin a little better. The way it feels when something like this happens..."

_"Understood,"_ she said softly. _"I won't try to stop you. However... it's interesting that you should mention Kevin; Hyperion came here long enough to drop off the weapons those two Destroyers carried, and we're frankly baffled by them. I think this is a mystery only Kevin can solve."_

"It's possible," Kira conceded. "But that can wait. Right now, I've got to stop those ASH units before they can come and do any more damage than their ground forces already did." Ahead of him, hatches slid open, as Freedom moved into the same launch position Nemesis had used days earlier, and he took a deep breath, before saying words he'd thought were long behind him. "Kira Yamato... Freedom, launching!"

* * *

"The ground operation has failed," the commander of the ASH units announced grimly. "All contact has been lost with Squads One and Two, and the last transmissions from Mongoose and Meerkat were the sound of energy fire and a piercing shriek, respectively. That means we have to finish the job ourselves."

"But, Sir," one of his men protested, "what about the reports that the Black Asp is basing himself out of here... and with a rebuilt version of the old Stormhawk?"

"The reports are correct," the commander replied, "but there's no sign of that machine tonight. Moreover, if my suspicions are correct, the way he killed Meerkat will have left him in no condition to fly. Now, continue the mission, troops."

"Aye, Sir..."

The first of the ASH units took one step forward... and then froze, optical sensors aimed at the sky. "Commander," its pilot said nervously, "there's something coming up over the cli-!"

A pair of railgun slugs smashed through his knees, reducing articulated joints to scrap metal, a pair of plasma bolts melted his arms into liquid metal, and a dart of emerald energy drilled into his unit's head, speared down through the body, and expended the remainder of its energy in the center of the cockpit.

The ASH commander stared in shock at the mobile suit that had suddenly arrived, and annihilated his subordinate. "It can't be," he whispered, seeing the all-too-familiar body shape, distinctive "Gundam-style" head, and ten graceful wings... all framed by two plasma cannons, a pair of rail cannons, and a Lupus beam rifle. "That... that's the Freedom! Take evasive action, and fire at will!"

He and his four surviving subordinates scattered in all directions, forcing their machines, relatively clumsy on land, to dodge back into the island's undergrowth... which, unfortunately, was not nearly as effective at hiding mobile suits as it would have been hiding commandos.

Even more unfortunately, Kira Yamato had no intention of letting any of them escape alive. It had been a long time since he'd deliberately killed anyone save the madman Rau Le Creuset... but that didn't mean he didn't remember _how._

The -new- point man for the attackers was dodging frantically back, but he knew he couldn't possibly make it to safety before Freedom got to him without a miracle; so he did the only thing that could possibly even delay his implacable enemy.

Missiles rocketed out from the ASH's back-mounted launcher, and emerald beams lanced from between the claws on the machine's "hands". With a little luck, the pilot hoped, they'd keep Freedom busy for a few critical seconds.

What he didn't count on was that Kira Yamato was the best pilot in the world.

Kira unleashed a burst of CIWS fire on the missiles, shredding them into shrapnel mid-flight, even as he twisted Freedom around to make the emerald darts flash harmlessly past. _I won't let you get away with this,_ he thought almost calmly, his anger still burning bright... and behind his eyes, an amethyst seed burst.

With his mission this time being to destroy rather than capture or disable, Kira could've taken all five remaining enemies simultaneously. That sort of thing was what Freedom had been built for, after all, unlike Kevin's Nemesis, which specialized in total destruction of single or massed targets. Tonight, though, Kira wanted to do this the hard way... to make sure they _knew_ what was happening.

He knew he'd regret at least some of this later, but after Lacus' brush with death, he didn't really care just then.

The ASH was still firing desperately, but Freedom effortlessly wove among the emerald darts, not even bothering to take them on its shield, and its weapons unfolded again as it entered HiMAT mode. Plasma cannon and beam rifle muzzles glowed, and rail cannons once again charged their electromagnetic rails... before all five weapons discharged at a single target.

The ASH's pilot had time for one, brief scream as the massive bombardment of energy and heavy projectiles smashed into him. The ASH itself went from being solid armor to a blob of liquid metal, which itself was instantly blasted into a rain of molten droplets by the impact of the rail cannon slugs.

The commander cursed. Ten seconds, and he was down to just three subordinates... and it didn't help that ZAFT already held the Freedom in almost superstitious dread. Some revered it... but all feared it, when it was on the other side. It had never been known to take lives before -except in the destruction of the ZGMF-X13A Providence- but none doubted it was capable of it... as the past ten seconds had proven.

"Keep firing!" he ordered now. "Retreat, and try to hold him off until we reach the water! Not even Freedom can hurt us down there." After all, Freedom _was_ a space model. It was also highly effective in atmosphere, but it had never been designed with underwater operations in mind.

Regrettably, Kira Yamato had no intention of letting them get anywhere _near_ the water.

An third ASH leapt sideways, narrowly avoiding a pair of plasma bolts; they instead started a small fire amidst the trees. The second pair of red-orange bolts, however, did _not_ miss.

Hovering invisibly above the battlefield, Hyperion was impressed. _And here I thought only Kevin could demonstrate that kind of lethal efficiency,_ the armored soldier thought. _But this... I don't think even he could do this. Not in a mobile suit, anyway. Which reminds me..._

While Freedom went into a spiral to dodge another barrage of missiles and beams from below, Hyperion's radio implant came alive. "Max," the soldier murmured, "you there?"

_"Affirmative, Hyperion,"_ the ex-AI replied. _"Something up? Besides the massive thermal signatures coming from Izanagi, I should say, which I assume indicate the situation over there is being handled."_

"Yes," Hyperion acknowledged, "I think it's safe to say that it's being 'handled'. However, that's not what I was calling about. I believe the _Archangel_ is going to be departing Orb within the next couple of days... and I think we should meet before that. Face to face, I mean."

There was an eloquent pause on the other end. _"Face to face?"_ Max said finally. _"Unless you're ready to take off that armor -and reveal your identity, whatever it may be, in the process- I'm not sure that's practical in Orb."_

Hyperion chuckled. "Don't worry about it; I have my ways of remaining disguised even without the armor."

_"I see... In that case, I'll be free this afternoon. I've got a few more details to clear up at Morgenroete -nothing major, just some presents to plant."_

"Presents?" The armored soldier's head shook. "Never mind, I don't want to know. Where do I meet you?"

_"Make it The Western Eating Parlor; Kevin says the food there is good, and it's set up for this kind of meeting."_

"Understood. I'll be there." The Excalibur swivelled in the air... and with a blast of afterburners, left the battlefield to the killer and the killed.

Kira was, at that moment, zeroing in on another of the ASH units, and this time, a saber was in Freedom's hand._ You're not getting away,_ he thought distantly, and the blade of frozen fire batted aside an emerald dart the enemy pilot frantically sent his way. Then it lashed out, burning through the arm that had fired the blast, came back around... and seared deep into the ASH's torso.

It blew apart in a spray of shrapnel, and Freedom turned its attention to the last pair. Kira hurled his shield at one, bowling it over, and dove out of the sky at the other, blade flaming in his hand. With a ruthless dispatch that might've impressed even Kevin -known for his own single-minded lethality- he landed on one knee in front of the ASH, and swirled his blade in a figure-eight into the machine's torso.

The ASH leader, shaking his head to clear it and trying to get his machine back on its feet after the collision with Freedom's shield, cursed. _All of them down,_ he thought bitterly, _and all of them killed by the one machine that_ never_ destroys its enemies! I have to get out of here, report back before he can-_

A pair of plasma bolts struck his unit's torso, blowing it off its feet and leaving its chest a burnt, blackened ruin... with the pilot rather worse off.

ZGMF-X10A Freedom stood straight, and the blade in its hand died. Within its cockpit, Kira Yamato closed his eyes and sighed. When his eyes opened once more, they no longer bore the wide, clear look of the Berserker... and his mind was clear of the anger. No regret, no hatred, merely exhaustion.

_I understand Kevin a little better now,_ he thought. _But... I'm not like him. I know I can kill when I have to... but I can't do it without thinking about it afterwards. I guess I just don't have the temperament..._

(_More precisely,_) a tired voice said in his head, (_you don't have the combat conditioning I do. And that, tovarisch, is probably a good thing. Leona and I... we're not exactly "safe" people._)

(That's_ an understatement._) Kira allowed himself a small mental snort, then shook his head. (_How are you doing, Kevin?_)

(_Just fine, tovarisch,_) the super-soldier replied. (_A little under the weather still -it'll be a couple of days yet, at least, before I'm truly combat-ready again- but other than that, I'm okay. My abdominal wound was the only one even close to serious, and we've got it closed up._) There was a brief paused; judging from what Kira could detect from his head, Kevin was remotely linking with Avalon Base's perimeter security. (_I think you can land now; there's nothing else in range. Presumably there was a carrier in the area, to bring in those ASH units, but they'll be long gone by now. No _Vosgulov_ stays in enemy territory any longer than it has to... especially when all its mobile suits are wiped out so thoroughly._)

* * *

Kevin limped into Avalon's infirmary at the same time Kira arrived, looking tired but largely intact. His shirt and jacket were both in tatters, and blood streaked his face and soaked his clothing, but he was alive... unlike those that had done this to him.

That was almost more than could be said for Lacus.

She lay on a sickbed, an apparatus Kira had never seen before covering her lower torso; an IV tube was connected to her arm... but she was, barely, alive. "Hi, Kira," she said weakly, smiling up at him. "Is everything safe now?"

"Yes," Kira assured her quietly. "...How are _you_ feeling?"

Lacus managed a slight shrug. "The drugs Murrue gave me killed the pain; I just feel a little sick, that's all. She tells me I should be fine in a week or so."

"That's fast work," he said, impressed. "With a wound like that..."

"It's re-engineered Destroyer technology," Kevin explained, leaning heavily against the wall. "The best gear Medical Section used, short of our regenerative nanites. The only other set this complete is at Artemis; we're lucky this happened before we could, say, launch the _Archangel..._ though come to think of it, we'll probably end up taking the gear with us when we leave, in case my father should decide to reoccupy the base once we're gone."

"That's good to know," Kira said thoughtfully. "Especially since I'm pretty sure _Archangel_ doesn't have the equipment to maintain your own systems."

"Not at the moment, no," his friend agreed. "We're still working on that; and, in fact, I'm expecting a shipment soon. I've got Captain Daniels and _Concepcion_ coming down with a cargo of weapons, medical gear, and MBF-X15A/M Foxhound."

"Probably a good thing," Murrue interjected, walking in. "I think you should take a look at these, Kevin." She held out the blades Mongoose and Meerkat had carried, and Hyperion had retrieved after the battle. "I don't know much about them, but I think Hyperion was right about one thing: these aren't standard weapons."

Kevin took one of them, and drew it from its scabbard with a puzzled frown. "Katana-style high-frequency assault blades," he murmured, "just as I suspected. Old Destroyer technology, like the soldiers themselves. But there's something... Oh, that's not good."

"What is it?" Kira said sharply.

"Just this: now I understand why that bastard was able to cut through my claws so easily." The super-soldier tapped the blade. "That's not steel, or even titanium; in fact, it's no metal I've _ever_ seen ZAFT use before... but it marks them as having even more knowledge of ABADDON technology than my worst-case projections. These blades are made from DiaSteel."

"DiaSteel?" Murrue repeated. "I've never heard of it."

"No reason you should have. It's only practical use is in weapons like these, at least for now; it's devilishly hard to make, and as far as I know nobody's yet figured out how to mass-produce it." Kevin held the blade up to the light, revealing a peculiar crystalline pattern. "Steel is produced by purifying crude iron with carbon. This is made much the same way... except that it's iron purified with the purest form of carbon: diamond. Hence the name, DiaSteel. It has the tensile strength of steel, combined with the hardness of diamond."

Murrue blinked. "That has incredible potential as an armor material," she mused. "And in a blade..."

"In a blade, it would make short work even of _my_ bones," he acknowledged. "The only reason my cybernetic hand survived contact with it is that I have a _very_ thin layer of the stuff built into my current arm. This also explains Hyperion's seeming invincibility. My guess is that the vital areas of his armor, like the chestplate and perhaps part of the helmet, incorporate a thin layer of DiaSteel, as well. Which means, given how hard it is to make it, that something still exists that shouldn't."

Kira closed his eyes. "Let me guess: the ABADDON laboratory."

Kevin nodded. "It has to be, Kira. They had managed to forge a few kilos of DiaSteel by the end of the program... the only stockpile of any real size in existence. Even after two _years_ of research, Prometheus has only made two kilos of it."

"But..." Lacus coughed. "But who would want to kill _me?_ I've been living a peaceful life for two years; why would anyone want to...?"

Kira slowly shook his head. "I don't know about the 'why'," he said slowly, "but I think we can narrow down the 'who' pretty easily."

"ZAFT," Andy agreed grimly, walking in. "No other logical possibility. Those were new mobile suits they used; so new that not even frontline units have them. Their ground troops were using standard-issue ZAFT gear... and it's pretty obvious that those Destroyers weren't Earth Forces. I just can't figure out _why."_

"I'm afraid I can," Kevin said unhappily; and added, even more unhappily, "I also think we've got a problem. See, I know my old instructor very well... and I would not put it past her to launch an attack like this on her own authority, if she thought it would serve the PLANTs' ends. She's utterly devoted to their defense; the only thing that matters to her more is the unit. Which, of course, means that we have _two _suspects: Gilbert Durandal, and Natalya Ivanova Arkanian."

Andy sighed. "Wonderful. This plot is becoming positively Byzantine."

"But why?" Lacus asked again. "Why would ZAFT want to kill me?"

"Because of their charade," Kevin told her grimly. "Because of that imposter of you that they're using to keep the PLANTs calm. Her name's Meer Campbell; Tolle's managed to find out that much, at least. And their use of her makes you a threat to their plans by your mere existence."

She sighed. "If only they'd _asked_ first... I don't actually mind, you know, if this will help keep things peaceful up there. They didn't need to resort to such drastic measures..."

"Believe me, Lacus," her brother told her, "these people don't think that way; especially not Delta. Frankly, it's exactly the sort of thing _I'd_ do... because she taught me to. You remove all threats, no matter how remote."

Kira's hand clenched into a fist. "We can't let them get away with this," he said harshly. "Whether it was Durandal or your teacher, Kevin, they have to be stopped. ZAFT is already starting to take the wrong path in this war..."

Kevin gripped his friend's shoulder with his biological hand. "I know, Kira. And this much I promise you: whichever of them it was... will die. They've hurt me and my family one too many times. This time... I'm going right back to the top." His jade eyes were icy as he finished, "Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth... life for a life."

Lacus looked at him in concern. "Kevin, vengeance isn't the way..."

"No, Lacus," Kira said unexpectedly, gently taking her hand. "This time, he's right. Maybe not in motive, but... whoever did this has to be stopped, permanently. Just like Patrick Zala, Rau Le Creuset, and Muruta Azrael two years ago." He looked over at Kevin. "Kevin... this time, I'll back you up, no matter what happens."

The super-soldier smiled; the expression was not a pleasant one. "Thanks, tovarisch... but understand one thing: if it was Arkanian, leave her to me. She scares _me,_ even; you'd never come even close to killing that woman. If, on the other hand, it was Durandal... shoot straight, my friend."

"Ahem," Murrue interrupted carefully. "If you're done plotting regicide -not that I blame you- I believe there's another point that needs to be addressed."

Andy nodded in understanding. "Right. If ZAFT wants Lacus dead, then we can't go to the PLANTs... and if even the mansion isn't safe anymore, I don't think you can afford to stay in Orb any longer, Murrue." He tilted his head. "So... what do we do now?"

"We get everyone back together again," she said with hesitation. "Most of the crew is still here in Orb; the only ones who aren't, really, are a couple working at Artemis, and Natarle. And since she's _Dominion_ crew, not the old gang anymore..."

Kira nodded slowly. "You're saying it's time to launch the _Archangel_ again." After the revelation of Freedom's continued existence, he took it for granted that their old ship, their _home_ was still around, as well.

"That's right," Murrue agreed, and looked over at Kevin. "Well, Brother? You going your own way with _Amaterasu_ and _Dominion..._ or would you care to come with us?"

He smiled slowly, and reached out to grip her arm. "Been too long since the old girl sailed... and even longer since I was on her. Count me in... Sis."

* * *

A gray-haired man sat in a darkened office, high above Earth's surface, elbows resting on his desk and white-gloved hands clasped in front of -and partially hiding- his face. "What's the situation, Benedict?" Baron John Onishi asked quietly.

"Stable, Sir," the clone replied. "Regrettably, _D'Artangan_ managed to pull out, and Carter was med-evaced before we could finish him off, but there's no longer any direct threat to our possession of the base." He checked his watch. "As for the assault team... they arrived in Tibet two hours ago. If all goes as planned, the attack will begin in approximately five minutes, and the team will exfiltrate no more than half an hour after that."

"Don't underestimate their targets," Onishi warned him. "I don't know Natarle Badgiruel, but I do know she had at least some firearms training from my son. And Invictus... well, we all know _his_ reputation, don't we? Single-handedly wiped out virtually the entire Serpent Head unit, and served with distinction during the War. With his talents and the Mark IV battlesuit he keeps around, he's not to be underestimated."

"I know, Sir," Benedict said patiently, "and that's why I'm sending such a large force. Also, Bitter's going with them; with what Carter did to him, he should be able to handle any surprises."

"Hmph." The Baron closed his eyes. "I find that... that _zombie_ sickening, Benedict. Even worse than what my son became. Use him if you must, but dispose of him as soon as you can. That pathetic creature should at least get a decent death."

The clone nodded. "Understood, My Lord. As soon as the operation is over, we'll terminate him." He turned to leave, then hesitated. "...What about your plans on the surface, My Lord?"

"Soon," Onishi stated. "It's evident that my son intends to evacuate soon; that's undoubtedly why he launched _Amaterasu._ With him out of the way, we'll be able to reoccupy Dol Guldur easily enough... and then, perhaps, launch an effort to find my son's space base. It's obvious he has one; it's becoming quite clear that he _is_ aware of my continued survival, judging from the mysterious closure of and relocation of most of his activities. That makes me wonder _where_ he's moving them to."

"There _is_ that project in Jupiter orbit," Benedict pointed out.

"No," the "old man" said, shaking his head. "That's not it. It's only been underway for six months, and there's no chance my son would relocate his operations over three years from Earth. He seems to have some interest in harvesting hydrogen from the gas giant's atmosphere, probably for reactor mass, but that won't be his primary facility. No, Benedict, he's doing something in Earth orbit, and I want to know where."

"Understood, My Lord," Benedict said again. "I'll put the word out; maybe whisper in the ears of our ZAFT contacts."

"Agreed; but carefully. ZAFT, like as not, would simply destroy the place. _I_, on the other hand, want samples of what my son has been working on." Onishi smiled thinly. "I failed twenty years ago; I won't fail again."

* * *

Flay Allster was sitting in the mountainside house's workshop, carefully cleaning her pistol -which she'd hung onto partly out of sentimental value; she'd taken it from one of Carter's clones, and it had literally proven a lifesaver in the process- when she perceived something was wrong.

John had been giving her more advanced instruction in small arms and basic unarmed combat in the days she'd been on Do'gyaling, since she'd professed a desire to master the trade that had been forced upon her by circumstance; now her natural accuracy had begun to turn into something approaching the trained skill Natarle -who had actually done most of the firearms teaching, since John professed to being about as accurate as a drunk rhinoceros- possessed, and she was beginning to feel more confident in her ability to take care of herself.

"A lot different from when Le Creuset captured me two years ago," Flay murmured, reattaching the pistol's slide with what had become practiced ease. "If it happened again, I just might be able to..."

She trailed off, head cocked. In the aftermath of her escape from Carter's base, she'd learned to pay attention to her instincts, and now they were telling her that something wasn't quite right. A sound... no, many sounds. The sounds of feet, quiet individually but quite noticeable in such numbers.

And since Flay was fairly certain no one on the face of the Earth was supposed to know the Tyler home even existed, she thought it was probably time to wake up the owners.

Reassembling the pistol and reloading it in three seconds flat, she shut off the workshop lights, and ducked back into the house proper. John and Natarle had dropped off on the living room couch a few hours before; incongruous though Flay found it, coming from a pair of hardened combat veterans, they'd fallen sleep in the mundane activity of movie watching.

"Sorry to disturb you," Flay said in a low voice, "but I think we've got trouble."

The man sometimes known as Invictus was swiftly awake; his life in the shadow world had long prepared him for waking up on a moment's notice. Similarly, Natarle's military training -and months aboard the _Archangel_ in her long journey from Heliopolis to Alaska- had her awake in seconds. "What's going on?" they demanded simultaneously.

The redheaded pilot blinked; she didn't remember them doing _that_ before. _Must have lived together long enough..._ a distant corner of her mind thought, and then she shook herself. "I'm not sure," she said softly, "but someone's definitely coming this way... and trying to be quiet about it."

John raised an eyebrow. "Trying?"

"You don't hide the sound of that many feet moving that easily. And..." Flay hesitated. "The pattern sounded familiar; like someone I know walking, except more than one..."

The ex-ZAFT assassin frowned, and opened his mind... and his face paled. "Solkin syn," he swore, unconsciously mimicking the man he'd been modeled after.

"What is it?" Natarle asked, walking to a wall cabinet. "I don't like the way you said that."

"I don't like the fact that I had to say it," he replied grimly. "I feel a lot of presences... all of them operating on the same wavelength."

Flay swore; a vile Russian epithet she'd picked up during her time as Kevin's communications officer. "Carter's clone army," she hissed. "They must've followed me down..."

"No," Natarle disputed, pulling a four-barreled Metal Storm pistol from the cabinet. "If they'd picked up your trail, they'd have been here days ago. No, this must be Onishi's doing; they somehow found out where John and I were, and decided to take us both out..."

"Well," John said grimly, "they're not getting us today. Flay, get out back and start up your Impulse; Natarle, get to the basement and start warming up the Skygrasper. We're pulling out of here as soon as possible."

Flay nodded. "I'll get right to it. But... what are _you_ going to do, John?"

"Me?" He smiled, but the expression was anything but friendly, as he walked to a concealed compartment in the wall, near the visible gun cabinet. "I'm going to... deal with the situation." Disarming the compartment's lock via his implanted neural links, the door slid open... and he withdrew a set of powered battle armor from within it. "It's been a long time since I went for a hunt, but I think it's time I taught these fellows I haven't lost my touch."

"Assuming you really haven't," Natarle said softly. "Be careful out there, John."

He smiled again, more naturally. "Hey, you know us Kevins Walker, Natarle; we don't die _that_ easily."

* * *

It had been a long time now since John Tyler had assumed the mantle he'd been born under, of the assassin Invictus. Like Kevin Walker, he'd put his past behind him after the war, and with rather greater success, as his memories were not quite as bleak. Death and destruction, yes... but not on the scale the Crimson Tiger was infamous for.

Therefore, it was actually something of an effort for him to return to the old way of thinking, as he sealed his helmet and made for the door. An effort... but one he _could_ accomplish. He'd spent too long as Invictus to lose _all_ the habits.

Because of that, his hand was quite steady when he opened the door... even after he saw what was waiting for him.

"Well, crikey, mates," the assassin Invictus said to no one in particular. "If I'd known I was going to have so many guests, I'd have put some coffee on."

No fewer than fifty clones, dressed like ninja, all armed with straight-blade, single-edge swords, stood on the plateau that served as the home's front lawn.

"I guess your sense of humor is just as odd as that of the man you were cloned from," their leader said contemptuously. "DNA is even thicker than blood, hm?"

Invictus gazed at him shrewdly. "You... you're no clone."

"No," the man agreed. "But Walker and I _are_ acquainted. My name is Bitter, Evan Bitter. Ring any bells, assassin?"

Unfortunately, it did. Invictus didn't immediately recognize the name himself, but his implant database instantly supplied the name. _Evan Bitter: Piloted AMF-101 DINN during first _Archangel_ sortie on Earth in C.E. 71; shot down by GAT-X401 Punisher's multiphase energy cannon. Presumed KIA._

Clearly, that last piece of information had proven to be inaccurate; not that _any_ of it really helped Invictus at this particular moment.

"Well," he said after a moment, "I suppose this isn't a social call, hm? Fifty armed clones don't just show up on one's doorstep for tea and dumplings, generally. Shall we cut to the chase?"

"Oh, yes," Bitter agreed, smiling behind the mask that covered the lower half of his face, "we'll _cut_ to the chase." He reached over his right shoulder, gripped the hilt of his blade, and yanked it out.

It was clearly a prearranged signal; all his companions drew their own weapons in the same instant, and the front ranks charged at the armored assassin.

Invictus hadn't been idle in the half-second it took them to begin the attack. Even as they moved, so did he, pulling the katana off his own back and leaping right into the fray. _Flay, Natarle... get clear,_ he thought, as his blade snapped up to fend off the first strike, while he landed among the clones. _I'll do what I can to hold them off... and who knows? Maybe I'll actually survive this mess._

His conscious mind was no longer in command of his body; not even a _Homo Sapiens Modifica Extremis,_ augmented with mechanical and chemical neural enhancements, could consciously fight a battle like this. As in all martial arts, his trained reflexes took over, reacting with the blinding speed his cybernetics and armor gave him.

Invictus' blade slashed out, tearing through the neck of the clone who'd first attacked him, and then he was hitting the dirt, throwing himself into a shoulder-first roll underneath more blades than he cared to think about. He came out of the roll in a spinning slash, cutting the legs out from under two clones and ripping through the chest of a third. Then he was forced to snap his blade up in a vertical block to intercept a horizontal slice aimed for his neck, and he took that moment to snatch the standard-issue ZAFT machine pistol from its holster on his left hip.

Another clone leapt into the air, attempting a lunging chop, and Invictus backflipped in response, twisting in the air and unleashing a long, snarling burst from the machine pistol. He might've been "about as accurate as a drunk rhinoceros", but in that mass of enemies, every bullet was guaranteed to hit _something,_ even if most of them hit only a handful of the same targets; but its magazine was soon expended, and he released the weapon even before touching down.

That was when he instinctively snapped his left arm up to block two blades at once, expecting the armor to shrug off the blades with ease... an assumption that almost proved fatal.

Invictus cried out, in surprise as much as pain, as the blades tore through his armor, biting deep into the arm beneath. "You _bastards!"_ he hissed, letting the arm fall limp, and frantically countered with the blade in his good hand. _High-frequency assault blades,_ he thought grimly, commanding his augmentation to do something about the loss of blood from the deep gashes in his left arm. _Carter's learned more than he should've; now I'm about to pay for it. I can still win this... but I'm going to get hurt._

Jerking his head to the left to let a katana hiss harmlessly through empty air, Invictus retaliated with a vicious roundhouse kick; the armored-augmented strike blasted the clone five meters into the air and ten back, breaking his neck in the process... and knocking two more clear off the cliff. They vanished with shrill screams.

"You're good," Bitter called over the sounds of slashing steel. "But the only reason you're still alive now is because these cannon-fodder clones have about the intellect of attack dogs; if they were up to Walker's mental level, you'd already be dead."

"Lucky for me Carter's paranoid, then," Invictus shot back, burying his blade deep in a clone's chest. "Do you think I'm actually going to let any of you live?"

"I should be asking _you_ that," the ex-ZAFT pilot fired back with a savage grin. "In fact... Argh!"

Invictus' eyes widened behind his helmet as Bitter suddenly dropped his blade, clutching at his chest. _What's happening to him?_ the assassin wondered, gritting his teeth as the distraction cost him a slash somewhere near his ribs. _That looks like-_

Even the clones gave way for a moment in the wake of what happened next. Bitter doubled over, breath coming in gasps... and his body began to change. Gray fur began to sprout from his now-elongated face, a tail started to grow from the base of his spine...

And just as he became fully wolf, Invictus slammed the pommel of his katana into the back of his neck. "I probably ought to kill you," he told the unconscious wolfman, "but I think Kevin would like to know how you wound up as an unstable man-made zoanthrope. Therefore-"

He cut himself off with a gasp, as a blade penetrated the backplate of his armor, leaving a slash just a little too close to his spine for comfort.

Invictus immediately spun around, eviscerating his attacker with a vicious slash, but he was weakening, and he knew it. Any one of these clones he could've taken in a heartbeat... but there were still dozens of them around him. _Too many,_ he thought grimly, catapulting a clone with a brutal sidekick. _Sorry, Natarle... guess I couldn't make it after all. Just get out of here, love, before..._

_"Enough!_"

The shout took even the clones by surprise, causing several of them to turn their attention away from their primary target... in a few cases, just in time to lose head or heart to forty-five caliber bullets. Someone had come up from the narrow mountain path, firing an automatic pistol with deadly accuracy.

When Invictus' augmentation registered an active implant signature -a familiar one, at that- he could hardly believe it. "Carter?" he said in a low, startled voice. "What is _he...?"_

The ex-ZAFT clone took a flying leap over the heads of his former army, firing as he came, and landed at Invictus' side. It was clear that he'd been a in nasty situation himself not long before; his clothes, a near-identical copy of Kevin's, were tattered in places, and soaked with Carter's own blood.

"I've got a bit of a situation going on myself," Carter informed his fellow clone, taking the time to reload before the enemy could adjust to his arrival. "Frankly, Invictus, that's the only reason I'm here. I'm not really out to kill you -you've no impact on whether or not I can become the one and only Kevin Walker- but that doesn't mean I like you, got it?"

"Yeah, sure," Invictus grunted. "...You notice you've lost a lot of blood, mate?"

"Later," Carter dismissed. "We can talk about it after we take care of these guys. Man, I wish I'd never had them created in the first place..."

"That makes two of us," the assassin informed him. "At least. But _we_ don't need to do anything about what's left; the cavalry's here."

Carter glanced at him, confused by the sudden, savage grin visible through the transparent part of Invictus' visor. "Wha...?" Then he heard the sound of something large getting into motion, and he, too, abruptly shared the grin.

The attack-clones looked at each other in confusion, and then one of them had the bright idea to look up... at the huge foot that had appeared above their heads.

They'd noticed the silent, powered-down Impulse when they arrived, of course; difficult to miss a sixteen-meter-tall mobile suit when it's standing right next to a house. They'd dismissed it, however, believing that their job would be over before anyone could get aboard.

Now they found that it was ever harder to miss when it stared down at them... and, even as carefully-directed bursts of CIWS began ripping into their fellows, the foot descended mercilessly.

Invictus winced. "That girl's gotten a vicious streak lately," he murmured to his reluctant ally. "I don't think she likes your clone army very much, mate."

"Neither do I," Carter grunted, stiffly holstering his Heckler and Koch pistol. "If I'd known they'd turn on me this easily... Who's in that thing, anyway?"

The assassin smiled. "Your old guest, of course."

Carter blinked. "You can't mean Flay? Then... she's alive?"

"Aye, mate, she most certainly is." The smile became a grin. "Seems a certain super-soldier you hate taught her a few tricks while she was serving on _Dominion;_ she used those to kill the clone sent to deal with her, appropriate his weapon, lead a merry chase through your base, download all of your classified data, lead another chase, and have a brief shootout in your hangar with 'our' father... before heading out into deep space with your stolen Impulse, and, after making a brief alliance with the Star Thief, landing here on Earth."

The other clone sagged. "You've no idea how glad I am to hear that, Invictus," he said softly. "I kidnapped her to keep her safe, you know; the thought that, in the end, my protection had killed her..."

"Well, it didn't," Invictus informed him. "Which is a bloody good thing; I doubt Kevin would be very pleased with you if it had. But... there's something else I'd really like to know, before we start taking this apparent truce too far." He nodded at Bitter's unconscious body. "Just what in the world is up with _him?_ I thought he was dead."

Carter shook his head wearily. "Not... exactly... I'll explain... when I've had a chance to... rest for a while..."

The blood loss had reached a critical point. Jack Carter, former enemy and now apparent, however uneasy, ally, felt his eyes roll up in his head, and he collapsed.

Invictus knelt at the other man's side, and quickly checked for signs of life. _He's still alive,_ he thought clinically, _but we'd better get him out of here quickly, or he won't be for long. But what the bloody blazes is going _on_ here? Why did he...?_

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of twin jet engines, as Natarle brought the matte-black Skygrasper -originally calibrated for none other than Kevin Walker- in toward the cliff, having flown it out the concealed tunnel toward the opposite side of the mountain. She brought it in for a deft landing, shut down the engines, and popped the canopy. "You okay, John?" she called.

"Yeah," John replied, straightening painfully. "Mostly, anyway. Look, we need to get out of here; this location is clearly compromised. And... we're taking Carter with us." He nodded at the unconscious clone. "He turned up at the last minute; looks like his clones are out to get him now, too... and _did_ get a piece of him before he even got here. And then there's that wolfman over there. That's Evan Bitter, the DINN pilot Kevin fried two years ago in Africa; Carter seems to have revived him somehow, and turned him into a manmade zoanthrope."

Natarle sighed. "So much for our break, huh?"

"I'm afraid so," he agreed. "Let's get Carter and Bitter stuffed behind Flay's seat in the Impulse, then clear out; I'm afraid that, this time, we've got more than the Earth Forces or even ZAFT to deal with."

* * *

Dawn had arrived, over the battered Onishi Mansion. The wreckage of the ZAFT mobile suits had been carefully removed, and the bodies of the assassination squad disposed of; Kevin had personally tossed Meerkat's body into Nemesis' reactor, to prevent any chance of Orb or the Earth Forces obtaining Destroyer technology from it. Of Mongoose, of course, only ash remained from Hyperion's particle beam attack.

"What a mess," Kevin sighed, standing in the ruins of the mansion's entrance foyer. "What with all the blast damage, the holes in the walls, and the splintered floors, it's gonna cost over three million dollars to fix... This is even worse than cleaning the carpet in the armory after Carter's stunt."

"Could've been worse, Cap'n," Meryl pointed out, stepping out of the concealed elevator to Avalon. "At least they didn't blow up the _entire_ building."

"True," he conceded, "but they intended to." He held up an innocuous-seeming device, little larger than a football. "I took this off the body of their demolitions man; it's a Pax 19 fuel-air explosive, intended for just this kind of work. It's a ZAFT design; we were testing them at the ABADDON lab, five years ago." He glanced at her. "But you already knew that, didn't you."

She wasn't surprised by the definitive tone. "I knew that was a Pax 19, yes," _Dominion_'s helmswoman admitted. "I didn't know it originated with ABADDON, but I did know about them." She smiled slightly. "I suppose you want to know more about that, huh?"

"You could say that," Kevin acknowledged. "What were you, before being assigned to _Dominion?_ An intelligence officer?"

"No." Meryl turned to look out one of the surviving windows, a thoughtful look on her face. "No, actually, I was a double-defector by the time we met on _Dominion._ Started out with the Atlantic Federation Navy, got assimilated into the Earth Forces upon their inception, and stayed with them... for all of a week. As soon as I heard about the Bloody Valentine, I jumped ship."

Kevin raised an eyebrow. "You actually defected to ZAFT? I'm surprised they let you in at all. I know they used some Naturals even then, but..."

"I'm a Coordinator, Captain," she said quietly. "And, as you probably noticed last night, a zoanthrope. I hide the former by holding back in my work, and the latter via a psychometric interference device ZAFT provided me with upon my entry into their forces."

"Explaining why I never sensed a thing after I took _Dominion,"_ Kevin mused. "And before that, I simply wasn't experienced enough..."

"I knew _you_ were one right off, though," Meryl informed him. "You weren't among the Annals of Zoanthrope Bloodlines my parents handed down to me, but I knew what you were." She grinned. "My great-grandmother was a woman named Jane Gado."

That got his attention. "Jane Gado? You mean...?"

"Shina the Leopard," she confirmed. "Long story, which I'll give in full some other time. Back to my original point, I went over to ZAFT after the Bloody Valentine, and remained with them for over a year; in fact, you and I were actually on opposite sides in two separate battles of the War. I was crewing on _Ziegler_ when the Eighth Fleet went down, and I was also a survivor of Alaska." She chuckled. "That was an interesting one; imagine my surprise when I saw Leona Colde come over to us at Jachin... Anyway, I jumped ship a second time around the time of the Battle of Orb." Her expression clouded. "I... learned about GENESIS, you see."

Kevin nodded slowly. "No wonder you didn't seem all that surprised by it. What surprises _me,_ though, is that you were able to convince the Earth Forces to let you back in at all."

Meryl shrugged. "In the confusion of records after JOSHUA and Panama were lost, I managed to convince them that I'd been part of a deep-cover intelligence operation; they were suspicious for a while anyway, but since I was genuinely committed to defeating ZAFT -because I was terrified of GENESIS- they eventually accepted my story hook, line, and sinker."

"Figures; Azrael never once guessed that he was being used by Rau Le Creuset, so I guess it's not so surprising they'd accept your tale without much trouble." He rubbed idly at the scar bisecting his face. "Of course, our problem now is- Huh?"

She looked at him strangely as he cut himself off. "Captain? Something wrong?"

"No, not exactly," Kevin replied absently, he was staring out through the ruins of the front door. "Myrna?" he said in surprise, walking over to the figure that had appeared there. "What're _you_ doing here?"

Meryl twitched in surprise. Myrna was Cagalli Yula Athha's maid; given the... tension between Cagalli and Kevin at this point, she couldn't think of any reason why Myrna would be coming to Onishi Mansion. _Unless... something's happened?_

"I've a message for Kira Yamato, Captain," Myrna said, inclining her head in greeting; her form of address showed that she was aware of Kevin's current distaste for his noble heritage. "Is he here?"

"Just a second, Myrna." Kevin closed his eyes, allowing his expression to go blank as he concentrated. (_Kira,_) he said silently, (_Myrna just arrived at the front door; she says she has a message for you, presumable from Cagalli. Better get up here._)

(_Already on my way,_) Kira replied, giving his friend the impression of a moving elevator. (_Any idea what's up?_)

(_Not a clue, tovarisch; though the fact that the message is for you would at least explain why she came _here._ I'd be much surprised if Cagalli had anything to say to _me_ right now._)

"I guess you're right about that," Kira agreed sadly, stepping out of the elevator; to her credit, Myrna didn't even twitch at the apparent non sequitur, having some knowledge of her own of the bond between the two pilots. "You said you had a message for me, Myrna?"

"Yes," the woman acknowledged, and held out an envelope. "Lady Cagalli would've preferred to deliver this in person, but as she couldn't, she asked me to send it in her stead."

Kira's eyes widened, and Kevin froze for an instant. "Is she hurt?" the super-soldier demanded.

"No, she's fine," Myrna assured him quickly. "However, she's currently being confined in the Seiran mansion, until the wedding."

Kevin's metal hand clenched. "That bastard," he whispered. "That rotten piece of..." He trailed off, muttering Russian imprecations.

Kira, meanwhile, opened the envelope, and withdrew the letter. _It's her handwriting, all right,_ he noted, knowing even as he did so that he was stalling. _I wonder what's happening now..._

_"Kira,"_ the letter read, _"I'm sorry I couldn't tell you this myself, but as Myrna will have told you, I can't. By now, you'll also have heard from Kevin that I'm engaged to Yuna Roma Seiran. It wasn't an easy decision -please believe me when I say that- but in these trying times, we need to unite the country behind strong leadership, and I'm afraid this is the best way to do it. I'm truly sorry I had to do this, and I know Kevin will probably never forgive me, or even set foot on Orb's soil again, but... I hope you, at least, understand why I had to do this, Kira._

_"Also inside the envelope this letter came in is a ring; I'm sure you'll recognize it. I hate to give it up, since it's one of the last ties I have to Kevin, but I can no longer wear it, and I'm sure Yuna would dispose of it in a heartbeat, given how much those two hate each other. Therefore, please, get it to Kevin, wherever he may be by now. And... tell him I'm sorry. I know it's not enough, but it's all I have the right to say to him now."_

Swallowing, Kira upended the envelope, and the distinctive ring, with its intertwined _K_ and _C_, dropped into his hand. _So she really did it..._ He started to turn to Kevin, holding out the ring... but the super-soldier had already turned away.

"No, Kira," he said quietly. "You'd better hang onto it. I... can't. Not now, maybe not ever. And I already know what the letter says," he added, in answer to Kira's unspoken question. "You weren't exactly thinking quietly while you read it."

Myrna had quietly slipped away, feeling it would tactful to leave the two alone (and unwise to be away from the Seiran mansion too long, lest Yuna realize something was up). Now, in her absence, Kira sighed. "What are you going to do, Kevin?"

"Follow my original plan," Kevin responded simply. "Nothing in that letter came as a surprise to me, Kira; none of it changes anything. The only thing left for me to do now is leave the country. By now, _Dominion_'s reactivation will be nearly complete, and most of her crew will be up at Artemis; now I need only get them some instructions, and get aboard _Archangel._ There's nothing left for me in this country."

"But we can stop this, Kevin," his friend protested. "You _know_ this will do nothing but hurt Orb if we let it happen. Don't you care-?"

(_I don't care about Orb,_) Kevin shot back silently, (_and you know it. Even Cagalli knew that the only reason I cared so much about it before was because she did, and with her leaving me, I've no more interest in this place, it being my homeland notwithstanding. And I'm not going to intervene in the wedding, either, because it would only make things worse between us._) He shook his head. (_No, Kira. This is no longer my affair._)

(_You're going to give up on her that easily?_) Kira's mental tone conveyed his surprise even better than spoken words would have. (_That's not the Kevin Walker _I_ know. The Kevin I know wouldn't let anyone get between him and anything he wanted._)

(_Which might mean something,_) the super-soldier retorted, (_except that this is a matter of some_one,_ not some_thing._ Cagalli's made her decision, for good or ill, and it's no longer my place to interfere. We all have our parts to play, tovarisch, and I'm not a knight in shining armor. I'm a killer, nothing more and nothing less. My part is on the battlefield, not rescuing the princess from her own mistakes, got it?_) Kevin turned away, and walked toward the elevator. (_You do what you want, Kira. Just don't expect any help from me._)

Kira sighed heavily, watching him disappear into the depths of the underground base. "You've had a hard life, Kevin," he said to himself. "If all this hadn't already happened to you... would you really let her go that easily?"

Like most hypothetical questions about Kevin Walker, this one had no answer. The odds were good that he wouldn't even have lived to this point had he not been taken into the ABADDON program; even if he had survived, it was unknown exactly what he might have been like at nineteen without the traumatic past that had shaped him.

Still... there was one tragedy that Kira could stop before it was added to Kevin's list. _Maybe you don't want to intervene... but I do,_ he thought, nodding to himself. _This is the wrong thing for Orb, the wrong thing for her... and it'll hurt you worse than you realize, Kevin. I can't... I can't let this happen._

_And I won't.  
_

* * *

Max Walker, Prometheus computer intelligence/hatchetwoman, looked up from her table as her cybernetics picked up an active implant signature entering The Western Eating Parlor. As she'd expected, the newcomer greeted Francois Delacroix, pointed toward Max's table, and was shortly walking over.

The former AI took the time to carefully examine the figure. Medium length brown hair, brown eyes, and a trench coat served to make the person both nondescript and somewhat androgynous; the coat hid the features below the face well enough that Max honestly wasn't certain if the figure was male or female.

"Neat trick," Max commented, as Hyperion slid into a chair across from her. "I've never seen a more natural-looking disguise."

The soldier smiled. "The miracle of nanotechnology," Hyperion replied; the voice, like the build, could've been that of a man or a woman. "Kevin could probably pull this off, too, if he wanted to; it's a little uncomfortable at first, but you get used to it." The soldier raised an eyebrow, taking in Max's own appearance. "And you... you've got some interesting tricks of your own. I expected you to appear as a hologram, but I discern a biological form, and a full set of augmentation... and your appearance is remarkably like someone I once knew."

Max nodded with a small smile of her own. "The miracle of nanotechnology," she said, using Hyperion's own words. "Nanotech, and genetic engineering. I had a body grown for me at Artemis, and used neural interfacing to 'download' myself into it. I can still interface with computers as easily as Kevin does, but these days, I'm just as bound to the flesh as you are."

"Remarkable," Hyperion murmured. "Not even Medical Section ever thought of attempting something as ambitious as this... But what of your genetics? That face, and those slit pupils, aren't the product of normal genetic engineering."

"No," Max agreed, "they're not. In fact, no true genetic _modification_ was involved at all. It was more a combination of two existing genotypes: Kevin's genes were mixed with DNA taken from bloodstains in his recovered escape pod, essentially doing artificially the exact same thing normal human reproduction does. What that means, really, is that I'm quite literally Kevin's daughter; that's where I get the slit pupils. Apparently some kind of unexpected twist from the zoanthrope genes."

Hyperion nodded slowly, eyes just slightly widened. "And... your 'mother'?"

"I think you already know," the former AI said softly. "If you were one of the original twelve, then you had to recognize my face instantly. Yes, Hyperion... I'm the daughter Kevin Walker and Rachel Carver never had the chance to have."

The soldier swallowed a slight lump in the throat. "From what I know of you so far, Max," Hyperion said quietly, "I think I can assure you that Rachel would've been proud to have you for a daughter."

"I like to think so," Max agreed. "From what Kevin's said, I _think_ that's true... but I guess I'll never know. Anyway," she went on, returning to the business at hand, "why did you want to set up this meeting in the first place?"

"A couple of reasons, actually," Hyperion answered, leaning forward. "First of all, I thought I should mention that I'll be shadowing you people when I can. I can't be around all the time -even one of us can't live in a fighter cockpit for weeks on end- but I'll be keeping an eye on you, and lend what assistance I can."

Max raised an eyebrow. "Let me guess: you're informing me to make sure _somebody_ knows you're doing it, so that you don't get shot out of the sky by friendly fire in the middle of a battle."

"Something like that," the soldier acknowledged. "Also... are there any particular threats you're worried about right now?"

Kevin's "daughter" hesitated for several moments. _How should I handle _that_ one? That information is still kinda confidential... but then Kevin told Cagalli, knowing that it would eventually get back to the Seirans... and he also asked Athrun to warn the PLANTs. I guess..._

"Yes, there is," Max said at last. "You know about Arkanian and the new Destroyers, obviously; what you may not be aware of is that Kevin's father is still alive... and trying to kill Kevin. We believe his ultimate goal is the overthrow of the Orb government."

Hyperion's eyes narrowed. "Baron John Tyler Onishi? So, he's still around... It may surprise you to know that I've learned a few things about him myself in recent years; but I'll admit even I didn't know the bastard was still alive. And if he's trying to kill Kevin..." The soldier smiled unpleasantly. "Then I'll have to do something about it. I don't suppose you know where he is right now?"

Max shook her head. "Unfortunately, no. We know his resources aren't what they once were; Dol Guldur is now under Kevin's control, as Avalon, and while it's evident that Onishi relocated to _Amaterasu_ after his supposed death, we've located and taken control of that, as well. It was heavily damaged in a space battle around the same time Kevin was kidnapped by ZAFT, and set adrift in orbit, where we eventually recovered it. Since then, though, the only sign of his whereabouts came when he murdered Frank Castile, and he promptly vanished again. We've got Tolle Koenig, our best surviving intelligence agent, working on it, but..."

Hyperion nodded slowly. "I see... Thank you, Max. I'll see what _I_ can do about the situation. Until the next time we meet..." The soldier pushed the chair back, stood, and started to turn.

"Wait," Max said quietly. "Listen, Hyperion... I know you prefer to operate anonymously, and I know you don't want Kevin to know who you are. But I'd find it a lot easier to understand what it is you're trying to do if _I_ knew your name. All well and good for you to say that you're one of the original twelve, but without a name..."

The soldier hesitated for a long moment, before replying, "If you swear never to breath a word of it to anyone else, especially Kevin, then I'll tell you."

"You have my word," Max said firmly, without hesitation. "And being the 'daughter' of Kevin Walker, I assure you that I don't break my word."

"I believe you," Hyperion acknowledged, gazing at her carefully. Then the soldier said a handful of words, eliciting a surprised look from Max, and left.

* * *

_I can still barely believe I'm going through with this,_ Cagalli Yula Athha thought, staring out a window without really seeing anything beyond it. She wore a white wedding dress, as befitted the day's occasion... but it didn't really feel right. _I still think it's the right thing to do, but... Oh, Kevin. What are you doing now, I wonder?_

She felt certain something had happened the previous night; explosions and energy fire had rocked Izanagi Island past midnight, going on for nearly an hour before silence had reigned again. Exactly what it had been was unclear, but she suspected Kevin's past had tried to erase him again, and tried rather harder than usual.

_Either that Arkanian woman,_ Cagalli thought, _angry over Orb's decision to sign the treaty... or Kevin's dad. One or the other; nobody else could've caused that much destruction last night... and no one else has the motive._ She snorted. _Okay, maybe there are lots of people with _motive,_ since Kevin's made enemies just about everywhere, but only a good special forces unit or someone with inside knowledge of Orb could've made all that racket._

One thing seemed fairly clear: whoever had started it, Kevin had most definitely finished it. If he hadn't, Avalon Base -and all the high-tech weapons Cagalli was sure he kept there- would be in the hands of someone else... and Kevin's own forces, wherever they currently were, would've launched a blitzkrieg attack of their own within hours.

_At least he's safe... I just hope that he gets on with his life, instead of fading away. Well, he survived killing Carver, I'm sure he can survive this. I just... never realized how much this would _hurt.

The two of them had known each other literally their entire lives; Cagalli's father had of course been Chief Representative, while Kevin's had been head of another of the Five Noble Families, and an important member of Uzumi Nara Athha's cabinet. They'd grown up together, been the best of friends. When she thought Kevin dead from the sniper her father had hired, it was like her heart had been torn out... when he'd come back two years later, she'd never been happier.

And when they finally got together, shortly after Kevin learned the truth about his own origins, Cagalli had thought everything was finally going _right_ for them.

Until now. Until the renewed war, and the balance of power within Orb's government, had forced Cagalli to make a decision she'd never anticipated... a decision that destroyed not only their relationship, but also their friendship. It also made her nervous for another reason, since she knew well that only she was able to command unquestioning obedience from Kevin. With the Crimson Tiger set loose from that...

_This had better be worth it,_ she thought tiredly. _If it's not..  
_

* * *

An hour later, she and Yuna Roma Seiran were in a limousine, heading for the chapel. The time had finally come... and not a moment too soon, as far as Yuna was concerned. _I don't know what Onishi was up to last night,_ he thought idly, _but the sooner this is done, the better. He won't dare try anything against me after this... not after I'm in power. And,_ he thought smugly, _at least I finally came out on top in our rivalry._

It was about then that he noticed how quiet Cagalli had so far been, simply staring out a window, almost listlessly. "Are you feeling nervous?" he asked, reaching into the limo's storage and pulling out a glass. "You haven't said a word so far."

She shook her head. "No, I'm fine, really. Don't worry about it." _As fine as I can be, under the circumstances,_ she added silently.

Yuna shrugged, pouring himself a drink. "Maybe so, but you don't look fine. You know, given the occasion, you really should smile. This is a day everyone in Orb is celebrating, after all."

"Yeah..." _Not everyone,_ Cagalli thought to herself, _but... probably most people really are. If they weren't, I wouldn't be doing this at all. But if they're happy... well, this is my duty as heir to my father's house._

She only wished that made this occasion any happier for _her.  
_

* * *

While preparations for a wedding were going on in Orb's capital, preparations for a very different, yet very pertinent, event were being made deep under the surface of Izanagi Island.

"So," Murrue remarked to Kira, as they rode the elevator down to Avalon's harbor, "you're really going through with it... Are you sure, though, that this is the right thing to do?"

"Yes," he said firmly. "Kevin won't -or can't, I'm not sure- intervene; I tried reminding him of the oath he made to Lord Uzumi to protect Cagalli, and all he said was that he didn't think kidnapping her from her own wedding was quite what Lord Uzumi had in mind. That means we have to do it... and we do, because it's the right thing to do. We don't have a choice, really. This marriage will destroy Orb, and Cagalli... and Kevin's like a brother to me. I can't just sit by and let him destroy _himself_ by letting her go."

She nodded in understanding. "I think Kevin could survive even this, if he had to... but I agree that this is something we need to do. For Orb's sake, for Cagalli's, and for Kevin's. Both of them have been through more than their share of hardships; it's time they got something in return." She leaned back against the elevator's wall. "Still... no matter what happens, I don't think Kevin will ever call himself 'Onishi' again."

"He won't," Kira acknowledged. "He can't, really; he could only maintain that identity for so long before it broke completely. He's just changed too much since his mother died."

He paused as the elevator came to a stop, and they stepped out of it into Avalon's massive harbor facility. Therein lay several docks; until recently, both had been occupied, but now only one berth was in use... by a ship they knew very well indeed.

The former Earth Alliance Forces Mobile Assault Ship _Archangel._

She was a good ninety meters longer now than she'd been at the end of the war; in the process of restoring her, Kevin's loyal Morgenroete techs had also made some modifications, including sufficient automation to run her with even fewer crew members than they'd had at Heliopolis, as well as adding a hot spring for relaxation.

_Archangel_'s crew knew better than almost anyone how much tension could build up on a lone ship, cut off from higher authority or even resupply.

Murrue was also aware that Kevin had begun upgrading the ship to the standards of his new-build warships, and_ Dominion,_ but unfortunately there'd not been time to add anything except support equipment for the Nemesis. There was a single, incomplete antimatter reactor in the engine room -which Murrue would've been reluctant to activate even if it _had_ been complete- and a small stash of anti-Destroyer weaponry, but that was it.

_And it's all we need,_ she thought, untroubled by doubt. _Because we fought all the way from Heliopolis to rendevous with Eighth Fleet, from Africa to Orb, from Alaska to space, and all the way through to Second Jachin. This ship and this crew can do _anything_ they put their minds to._

Murrue was, as ever, proud of her ship and her crew.

Next to _Archangel_'s hatch, Kevin stood with a clipboard in his hand, ticking off items in what she presumed was a pre-launch checklist. "Is everything going smoothly, Kevin?"

"So far," he confirmed. "Kojiro ran into Arnold earlier today, and got him back here; the rest of the core crew should be aboard about now. So far, all systems check out, too. I just wish we'd had time for some of those upgrades..."

Murrue smiled fondly. "You're a worrier, you know that, Brother? We'll be fine. Besides, if it's all the same to you, I'd rather not run the risk of using an _antimatter_ reactor aboard ship. That's even riskier than what you do with Nemesis."

"Point," Kevin conceded, ticking off one last item. "Besides, _Archangel_ would have power consumption on par with a _Prometheus_-class battleship, and we still don't have the hydrogen supply line set up. Anyway," he went on, setting aside the clipboard, "we should be just about ready to launch."

"Great," Kira said, clapping his friend on the shoulder. "We've got things we need to do, and places we need to be, right?"

"Right," the super-soldier agreed, unaware of Kira's actual intentions. "Anywhere but here, for starters. Oh, Murrue," he added, recalling something else, "we'll be making rendezvous with _Concepcion_ a few hours out. I just got the confirmation from Captain Daniels."

Murrue nodded. "That's good. I know _you_ can fight your own kind with relative ease, but I, for one, will sleep a little easier once we've got a few of those new anti-Destroyer weapons aboard. Not all of us can lift those railguns you brought aboard last month."

"True."

"We're getting a weapons shipment from Artemis?" Kira said, perplexed. "What for?"

"As Murrue just said, anti-Destroyer weapons," Kevin answered, stepping through the _Archangel_'s hatch. "Latest models; practical laser pistols, made possible via nanocircuitry. Unlike the Mark Fifteen railguns, or the plasma rifle Erica built for me -which wouldn't work against an active AKWES anyway- these are heavy, but manageable for an unaugmented human." He smiled. "_Concepcion_ is also carrying MBF-X15A/M Foxhound. Nemesis is a superb unit, but Foxhound is even better."

Kira shivered. "I don't think I want to know how; if I know you, it's got even more ways to blow things up."

"Not necessarily more," his friend mused, "but definitely better. And even you have to admit, Kira, that with the enemies _I've_ made I don't have much choice but to use a lot of heavy firepower."

That point Kira _did_ have to concede. Considering that he had soldiers strong enough to rip apart battle tanks barehanded going after him, as well as -on occasion- the full military might of both ZAFT and the Earth Forces...

"You know," Murrue said conversationally, as they walked deeper into the ship, "Captain Daniels is a good man, Kevin; he should be doing more than driving a cargo ship around."

Kevin nodded. "I know. That's why he's slated to command _Icarus,_ when she comes online in a few months."_ Icarus,_ of course, was the second ship of the _Prometheus_-class; highly advanced, very powerful, and astronomically expensive.

The cost of constructing those two ships was, in Murrue's opinion, probably the biggest reason he'd started making arrangements with certain mercenary groups, like Serpent Tail: even his pockets had limits.

"Well," Kevin said now, checking his internal clock, "I'd better get to the hangar. I'll be taking Nemesis up to assume an overwatch position of the area. Frankly, I don't trust Yuna not to send something after us the moment he notices we've moved."

Murrue nodded. "I'll see you after we launch, then. Kira?"

Kira glanced back the way they'd come. "I'll be back in a minute, Murrue; I... need to say goodbye."

"Of course. Well, I'll be on the Bridge; Andy and I have a few last minute preparations to make, I believe."

Waving briefly to Kevin -and smiling inwardly at the knowledge that Kevin had no idea what was soon going to be happening- Kira retraced his steps back out to the _Archangel_'s hatch. There was, indeed, a goodbye he had to say... and, linked as he was to Kevin, he'd caught a sense of someone's presence just outside.

As he'd expected, Caridad Yamato, the woman he'd grown up thinking was his mother -and _was_ his mother, for all intents and purposes- was waiting for him at the dock.

"So," she said quietly, "you and Kevin are really leaving again, aren't you."

"We have to, Mom," Kira said, quietly but with conviction. "This war, like the last one, has to be stopped... and it's not safe for either of us here anymore. You know last night could've been so much worse."

"Yes," Caridad admitted, "it could've been. You know," she went on, a distant look in her eyes, "it came as a real surprise to learn that your best friend, the one your and father and I took in at Heliopolis, was really a battle-weary soldier, with the entire world after him. I knew something had happened to him... but not that." She looked her son in the eyes. "I... I just don't want that to happen to _you,_ Kira. Learning what you did two years ago must've been hard enough..."

"I'll be okay, Mom," he reassured her. "Really, I will be. I... I can't guarantee that I'll come back safe, but whatever happens, it's because of the choices _I_ made. Because this is what I have to do."

"I know, Kira. And I'm proud of you; proud of everything you've done for yourself and for the world, and for everything you're going to do." She smiled. "You _are_ going to rescue your sister, aren't you?"

"Yes," Kira said firmly. "For her own sake, for Kevin's, and for Orb's. Letting this go through would be a terrible mistake... and I'm the only one who can stop it."

"I know," Caridad said again. "Just remember, wherever your travels take you... I love you, son."

"I'll remember," he promised. "I'll remember."

* * *

"Hard to believe that it's been two years since this ship last sailed," Murrue mused, walking slowly across_ Archangel_'s Bridge. "She's more of a home to some of us than anywhere else..."

"I know what you mean," Andy remarked, standing near the bow of the Bridge. "I've had enough time to watch you people since we first joined forces at Mendel, and it's been my observation that you and your crew really do feel that this place is home. I've never seen anything quite like it, really."

"Hm. Well, when you've got nothing but each other to rely on for as long as we did, you start to grow attached to each other, and to your ship." She walked over to join him. "Speaking of the ship... you know, you really do have more experience than I do. Perhaps _you_ should be the captain this time."

He smiled, and shook his head. "No, Murrue. The ship is badly shorthanded as it is; I may be needed to sortie. Besides... this is _your_ ship, Murrue, and your crew. From the time the _Archangel_ launched, you've been the captain, and that's how it should stay."

"Well... thank you." Smiling now herself, Murrue stepped back and sank slowly into the captain's chair. "All stations, please report."

"Helm, ready to go," Arnold Neumann reported, laying his hands almost tentatively on his flight controls. "Engines seem to be in working order."

"Electronic countermeasures on standby," Dalida Lolaha Chandra III called from CIC.

"Weapons on safety," Romero Pal announced from directly behind Murrue.

"Sensors online," Jackie Tonomura put in.

"CIC ready," another voice said, also from CIC. "Kojiro also reports Engine Room ready for launch at any time, Captain."

Murrue's eyes widened, and she spun her chair around in surprise. "Miriallia? What... what are _you_ doing here?"

Miriallia Haw -dressed in civilian clothing, like the rest of them; as Andy had pointed out, they weren't Earth Forces anymore, and Orb knew nothing of _Archangel_'s continued existence- smiled up at her captain. "I couldn't let the ship leave without me, could I?" she said in reply. "Besides, I'm a known associate of Kevin Walker; that makes this a safer place for me than Orb itself right now. Though I _could_ leave, if you wanted me too, Ma'am."

Murrue couldn't help but smile back. "No, Miriallia, that won't be necessary. And... welcome back." Still smiling, she faced forward again. "All right, Arnold. The word is given: launch _Archangel!"  
_

* * *

Kevin had another reason for wanting to launch as soon as the _Archangel_ entered open water, and it was actually more pressing to him than preparing for the eventuality that Yuna would discover the ship's presence. _Far_ more pressing, in fact, as the _Archangel _was moving _under_ the water, instead of on top of it. Another of the ship's modifications post-war had been the addition of submersible capabilities.

And so, the moment the ship was clear of the harbor, her starboard catapult -carefully sealed at the inner end- opened, and Nemesis, already in mobile armor mode, shot out, climbing furiously for the surface. The truth would've been obvious to some, especially those who remembered the fate of GAT-X401 Punisher.

The simple fact was... Kevin Walker had developed mild hydrophobia.

Underwater, he wasn't exactly catatonic, and he still enjoyed a good swim -since that was close to the surface- but ever since he'd been killed by water pressure, thanks to a shot from Dearka Elsman's GAT-X103 Buster, he'd been _highly_ uncomfortable with deep water. If he could remain close to the center of the ship, away from any viewports, he was almost fine... but just standing on the Bridge for too long, with those huge forward viewports, made him very, very jumpy.

It was with a genuine feeling of relief that Kevin burst out of the water, sailing into the sky at ever-increasing velocities. He was normally a soldier of the ground, the sort who spent his time in the mud, sneaking up on enemy positions to blast them into oblivion or silently eliminate their troops, but he also had a love of the sky. In the sky, there was a kind of freedom he couldn't get elsewhere; even a Destroyer couldn't fly without wings, and without wings, one's movements were limited.

Not so the blue sky.

But, he admitted to himself -grudgingly- he really did have duties up here today. "Walker to _Concepcion,"_ he transmitted via his mastoid radio. "Captain Daniels, do you read me?"

_"Affirmative, Sir,"_ the older man replied. _"Reading you loud and clear."_

"Excellent." Kevin wasn't a stickler for punctuality, but it _was_ nice. "ETA to de-orbit burn?"

_"Five minutes, Sir. We rendevous as arranged, Sir?"_

"Affirmative. Make planetfall fifty klicks northeast of Orb; we'll be making for Scandinavia once we're clear of the area."

_"Roger that."_ Daniels paused, apparently consulting something on his own ship. _"If all goes according to schedule, Sir, we'll offload the cargo onto _Archangel,_ then deploy our boosters and return to space. If it's all the same to you, I'd rather not stick around down there too long; doesn't sound real healthy for an unarmed cargo ship, under the circumstances."_

Kevin chuckled. "Agreed, Captain. Thing is, I don't think even orbit's going to be safe much longer; the sooner you get back behind Artemis' hyper jammers, the better. Walker out."

He shook his head as he cut the transmission. Sometimes, it still felt _weird_ to be in charge of a military force as large as Prometheus had become in the last two years. They'd started with one damaged ship, a single, badly battered assault mobile suit, one fully-intact stealth mobile suit, and a crew of misfits; now they had one fully-intact warship, two battleships under construction, and a number of new mobile suits. _Crazy world,_ Kevin thought, _crazy... huh?_

Kevin blinked, gazing back down at the ocean. _Archangel_ herself had surfaced... and the starboard catapult was open again. "What in the world is going on down there...? Nobody said anything about another launch..."

Even as he watched, ZGMF-X10A Freedom launched out of the catapult, streaking for the sky... on a direct course for Orb.

(_Kira,_) Kevin called, sending a strong mental frown towards his friend, (_just what do you think you're doing?_)

(_What you won't,_) Kira replied. (_I'm going to rescue her._)

(_Are you out of your mind?_) The super-soldier demanded. (_Leaving aside the fact that the wedding is going to be one of the most heavily-guarded events in Orb _history,_ and that you're going to have to fight through every bit of it to get there, you're about to make Cagalli very, very mad. I don't know about you, but _I_ wouldn't want to mess with her when she's that ticked!_)

(_You're just hiding from yourself, Kevin,_) Kira said complacently. (_You know you want to do this as much as I do... so why not help me?_)

(_Not happening,_) Kevin said firmly. (_I am _not_ crazy. You want to do this, fine; I won't stop you. Not sure I could if I wanted to anyway. But you'll do it without me. My presence would only make things worse, and you know it._)

He got the strong impression of a shrug. (_Suit yourself._)

Completely undeterred by Kevin's obstinance, Freedom streaked across the sky toward the center of Orb... while above, MBF-M1000B Nemesis simply faded from sight.

_If Kira's going to stir up a hornet's nest, I'd rather not be an easy target.  
_

* * *

Even now, standing at Yuna Roma Seiran's side at the chapel, Cagalli found it difficult to believe that this was actually reality. _But in a few minutes, it's something I'll have to live with for the rest of my life,_ she thought, almost detached. _Well... maybe I can at least use my influence to limit the damage Orb's treaty with the Earth Alliance can do..._

The priest at the altar had been speaking to the world at large -or so it seemed to her- for several minutes now, going on about asking the blessings of the goddess Haumea, but Cagalli wasn't really paying attention. She just wanted to get it over with... which was why it took her a few moments to realize the crowd assembled to witness the wedding had begun to stir.

It began as a murmur, but it was growing louder... and with it came the sound of Orb Murasame mobile suits mobilizing as though to counter come kind of threat. Whatever it was, even the guests could apparently tell it was coming, because they began to retreat at a walk... and then at a run.

"What's going on?" Yuna demanded. "Who dares interrupt-"

"It's the Freedom!" a guard blurted, staring at the sky. "The Freedom is coming!"

_"What?"_

Both Yuna and Cagalli spun around -clumsily, in her case, thanks to the wedding dress- just in time to see the Freedom soaring directly for them, completely ignoring the Murasames. After all, they wouldn't dare open fire in a place like this; not when members of _two_ of the Five Noble Families were all too close.

_It's Kira,_ Cagalli realized, shocked. _And the Freedom... so Kevin repaired more than just Stormhawk... but what is he _doing_ here?_

"Somebody stop that thing!" Yuna screamed, ducking behind Cagalli. "Get that away from here!"

"Grow up, Yuna," a contemptuous voice said. "And hiding behind the bride really isn't a sign of strength." Rondo Mina Sahaku, a complacent smile on her face, had appeared near them, casually observing the events. "And you call yourself a nobleman of Orb... Hmph. Kevin would never act like this, that's for sure."

_"I'm getting you out of here,"_ Kira's voice blared from Freedom's external speakers. _"Come on."_ Reaching out Freedom's hands with practiced gentleness, he ignored Cagalli's fulminating stare and increasingly loud complaints to gently pick her up off the ground, then fed power to Freedom's thrusters.

"Stop him!" Yuna shouted. "Don't let him get away!"

"We're deploying Murasames to follow him, My Lord," a guard assured him. "With the Chief Representative aboard, we'll have to be careful, but by the same token _he_ can't evade very well."

"It won't be enough," Mina said, shaking her head. "You don't know that pilot -or his friends- as well as you think you do. Do you honestly believe that the hero of Second Jachin is going to be that easy to stop?"

"We can't let him get away," Yuna shot back. "He's kidnapping my wife, the Chief Representative of Orb!"

"She's not your wife," she said calmly. "At most, she could be called your fiancé, since the vows weren't exchanged before Freedom arrived. And since you effectively tricked her into accepting your proposal, I think you'll find the engagement broken off as soon as she's gotten a sufficient tongue-lashing from her brother and Captain Walker." She turned, and began walking away. "Mark my words, Yuna: you'll have reason to regret today. You made a big mistake by making an enemy of Kevin Walker in the first place; now your incompetence has led to his strength being returned to him. I just hope you live long enough for Kevin to show you how a rivalry _really_ ends."

* * *

"Kira," Cagalli demanded furiously, "just what do you think you're doing?"

"Saving you from yourself," Kira replied, opening Freedom's hatch. "This is the wrong thing to do, and you should know it."

"It was _my_ decision to make," she shot back, "and you have no right to abduct me from my own wedding!"

Her brother sighed. "Cagalli, maybe once we get back to the _Archangel,_ you'll understand just what you've done... and what we've just rescued you from."

She closed her eyes. "The _Archangel..._ I should've known. So _everybody_ was lying to me about what was destroyed at the end of the war?"

"I didn't know until recently myself," Kira answered, "and as for Kevin, I don't blame him. If I'd known, I might've thought he was being paranoid, but... well, he _is_ usually right about these things." His voice hardened. "And in case you forgot, you hurt him very badly by doing this."

To that, Cagalli had no answer. She couldn't even meet her brother's eyes... which was why she caught sight of their pursuers just before he did. "Kira..."

"I see them," he acknowledged, feeding more power to Freedom's verniers. "You'd better get in; I can't maneuver very well with you out there."

"Right." Whether she approved of his actions or not, she had no desire to frustrate them by falling to her death, so she readily climbed into Freedom's cockpit. "But what do you plan to do _now?_ They're sending practically all the Murasames we've _got_ to stop you."

"They can't stop Freedom," Kira said confidently. "I may be a little rusty, but..."

Turning to face the flight-capable mobile suits that were rising to meet it, Freedom snatched out a Lacerta beam saber, bringing to life a blade of frozen fire. Before any of them could so much as fire a shot, he dove toward the units that lay along his path, and slashed out with the fiery blade.

The Murasames unfortunate enough to be caught in the blade's path fell from the sky, their wings clipped to sparking stumps by the glowing weapon. Their pilots would survive impact, battered but alive... but their machines would need a great deal of work before they could fight again.

"Not bad," Cagalli admitted grudgingly. "But there's still more coming-"

Indeed, a dozen more Murasames were streaking up to chase them from behind, wings swept forward in mobile armor mode... but they shortly had other problems. Bolts of azure light spat from empty air, their synthetic lightning striking with precision. Wings were torn away or melted outright, and the machines began heeling over in uncontrolled dives, their pilots frantically switching back to mobile suit mode for emergency landings.

Cagalli gasped, and even Kira was startled, as the Nemesis wavered into existence ahead of them, buster rifles spitting synthetic lightning from either side of its nose. "Kevin," Kira called, "I thought you said-"

"I'm not getting involved with the kidnapping," Kevin told him, blasting another Murasame's main thrusters off with a low-powered bolt. "All I'm doing is making sure a couple of friends don't get shot out of the sky." His gaze turned briefly to Cagalli, visible on the edge of his own screen. "For the record, I had nothing to do with this. Until ten minutes ago, I had no idea it was even being planned."

That much Cagalli believed; given how elementally enraged he'd been the last time they'd met, she was quite sure he'd not had any intention of coming anywhere _near_ the wedding itself.

"But you know, Kira," Kevin went on, turning back to his "oath brother", "I really am surprised that you'd do this. Do you have any idea how many laws you just broke? That's always been more of a tendency of _mine,_ not yours."

Kira shrugged. "Laws are silent in time of war, right, Kevin?"

The super-soldier opened his mouth, closed it, and repeated the process for several moments. "Kira," he managed finally, "you're the last person I ever expected to quote Cicero at me."

Another shrug. "You deserve to be surprised sometimes yourself; you do it to the rest of us all the time." _And besides,_ he thought, quietly enough that Kevin couldn't hear it, _it's about time somebody startled _you_ speechless for a change._

Freedom and Nemesis flew on, seeking the safety of the _Archangel..._ and the conflict they all knew was coming.

* * *

Aboard the flagship of Orb's Home Fleet -currently part of a detachment that had scrambled to surround the _Archangel_- Captain Todaka watched the air battle with interest. _So,_ he thought, _things have changed... for the better. Somehow I don't think the wedding is ever going to be finished..._

"Sir," his radio operator called, "we've received orders from Command. They instruct us to retrieve Chief Representative Athha from the treasonous mobile suits... but we're to use caution, lest we cause her injury in the process."

"I see..." _Hm... this could be quite an opportunity. My Lord Kevin Onishi... or should I say, Captain Kevin Walker... what path will you and your comrades take this time? Whatever you choose, I have a feeling your fate will be happier than mine. I have to obey my orders, even if it means taking part in the Earth Alliance's battles against ZAFT..._ Todaka smiled slowly. _Yes, I have to obey orders... but I can also "interpret" them if I have to._

_And just now, that sounds like a very good idea._

"Hold fire," he ordered. "If we're to be cautious, then we'd best not fire at all; too much chance of harm coming to Lady Cagalli in the process. And..." He smiled wryly. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't think attracting the wrath of Nemesis is a very good idea."

"Agreed, Sir," his fire control officer said; from the sudden release of tension, it seemed that was the majority opinion of the bridge crew.

Todaka raised his hand in an ironic, but heartfelt, salute to the _Archangel_ as the two mobile suits slid neatly into her flight decks, and the ship dove beneath the sea. _Good luck, My Lady, Captain Walker... the future is safe with you._

_Safer than with that purple-haired idiot, anyway.  
_

* * *

Author's note: The assassination team has been wiped out, leaving Lacus injured but alive; now the former crew of the Mobile Assault Ship _Archangel_ have a chance to catch their breath... and to prepare for their new battle.

Meanwhile, the wedding of two Orb nobles has commenced... and been interrupted. With Cagalli Yula Athha taken from Orb, perhaps the war will take a new turn...

I realize this chapter is probably late; however, it was also _considerably_ longer than I expected it to be. Hopefully, it was up to standard, and interesting. Either way, let me know.

A general announcement: after months of brainstorming to get all the many details worked out, as well as making sure this story was well enough along that it wouldn't get sidetracked, I have finally completed preparations to begin the sequel to Birds of a Feather. It will be written concurrently with A Call to Arms, so you needn't worry about my abandoning either project; therefore, you should be seeing the first chapter of the new story in just a few weeks. -Solid Shark


	15. Chapter 15: Breaking the Ice

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

******Warning: This chapter may include spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk  
**

* * *

_"Something most people don't realize, when dealing with Kevin Walker, is that he's not nearly as cocky and carefree as he usually appears. He mocks his enemies freely, but while there's genuine amusement in there, it's also a tool, used to distract his enemy from his true intentions, and anger them to the point where they make a mistake._

_"In reality, his temper, while tightly leashed, can be volcanic at times –as I discovered a few times myself, when we fought in the first war- and he holds grudges as long as his target is alive. That became evident when he killed my father, three years ago, without a trace of remorse._

_"More than that, though, Kevin has… issues. Having been engineered as a soldier right from the moment his father created him, and then being cybernetically augmented at my father's order, he subsequently had the right half of his face and his right arm replaced by machines. As such, over a quarter of his body is mechanical, and I know he often wonders now where the line is drawn… where the man ends and the machine begins. In an age where the secrets behind his super-human abilities are spreading to almost every faction in the world, he questions his own humanity, wondering whether or not he's truly human any longer._

_"I, however, believe that Kevin bears the seeds of the future within him. His genotype is the only existing example of Homo sapiens modifica extremis, the warped and enhanced subspecies of humanity Baron Onishi and Ulen Hibiki created twenty years ago; more than that, he is the final product of the ABADDON program. With the genetics and cybernetics combined, I believe he and his descendents have the potential to truly be the "Guardians' that Onishi euphemistically named him. Kevin will live on, long after those who tormented him are gone… and his progeny will succeed him in his role._

_"Whether he likes it or not, Kevin serves a beneficial purpose in this world. The byproduct of his actions to avenge himself and protect those he loves is a certain protection of the world itself. Though he may be as much machine as man, Kevin is, nonetheless, human._

_"And an example of the heights humanity can reach… even as it was the depths that created him."_

Contribution made by Athrun Zala to _The Tragic Spiral of War,_ by Captain Kevin Walker

* * *

"Just what, exactly, was the meaning of that particular stunt, Chairman?"

Gilbert Durandal winced, faced with his hatchetwoman's wrath at close range. "You agreed," he began carefully, "that it might become necessary to eliminate Hydra, remember? If he became a threat-"

_ "If_ he became a threat," Natalya Ivanova Arkanian repeated. "Which, at that point, he had not. And we had also agreed, Sir, that he was _mine_ to deal with."

He shrugged. "Given your impending mission, I expected you'd be busy enough dealing with your own subordinates. And with all due respect, Delta, his reaction to your proposal several weeks ago wasn't exactly encouraging."

"I was busy, yes," she granted, "but not as busy as _that..._ and thanks to you, I have two less subordinates to be busy _with._ And as to his reaction, of course it was negative! That was just the initial meeting; I didn't expect him to make his choice then, when he still had to grapple with his loyalties. Given time, we could've convinced him to come to his senses. Now, however, that will be difficult, perhaps even impossible."

"Because we attempted to kill him?" Durandal surmised. "Yes, I expect that will complicate matters some."

"That... and your other objective." Arkanian shook her head. "Chairman, I will grant that Lacus Clyne presents a possible threat to our plans; if nothing else, having two of her around could be difficult to explain. Nonetheless, she is an innocent, with nothing at all to do with the current conflict except your use of her face on someone else's body." She began pacing, seeming at that moment more like a tiger than her old student. "More importantly, you may have just made the biggest mistake this office has authorized since Zala approved Kevin's kidnapping. You just attempted to kill Kevin Walker's cousin... and heaven help you if you succeeded. In my considered opinion, there is no force in this world more dangerous than Kevin Walker in vengeance mode."

"That may have been a tactical error," he conceded. "However, I don't believe she's dead; if she were, past behavior on his part would indicate he'd have flown up here and obliterated us by now. Moreover, didn't you say you could handle him yourself?"

"Under normal circumstances, I could," Delta acknowledged, "and at this point rather easily. Hydra has much to learn before he can hope to surpass the master. Nevertheless, I suggest you remember what happened five years ago... and how Meerkat was killed last night. Even I am less than confident in my ability to stop Hydra when he's in that particularly mind set; when he is focused, completely and totally, on utterly annihilating his foe, there isn't much that can stand in his way."

Durandal sighed. "You've made your point, Natalya Ivanova. Now that you've extracted your pound of flesh, may I ask what you think we should do about the situation?"

She stopped in her pacing, turning to face him. "First of all, no more attacks on his family. If you fail, he'll be furious; if you succeed, he _will_ kill us both. Second, leave Cagalli Yula Athha out of it. You hurt her, and there's an even chance he'll take his new mobile suit and wipe out this entire colony. Besides which, she's the only person who can keep him in check; kill her, and you remove any trace of restraint from his actions. And finally, do _not_ attempt action against him without my input again. With my direction, Mongoose and Meerkat could've taken him. Without it, not even Tiamat and the others of his breed could succeed."

He nodded thoughtfully. "You make good points, Delta. Very well, I'll do as you suggest. However..." He met her gaze levelly. "Despite this... disagreement, I trust you're still committed to the plan?"

Arkanian nodded sharply. "Naturally. I've come too far, and my people have sacrificed too much, for us to back out now."

"Then you'll be on your shuttle to the _Minerva_ on schedule."

"Yes." She shook her head, a faint look of disgust appearing on her face. "If nothing else, _someone_ has to try to keep that petulant brat out of trouble. He's got good skills and good instincts, but he really needs an attitude check. Or maybe just a good whack on the head."

Durandal smiled wryly. _If there's one thing about Delta that I can always predict,_ he thought to himself, _it's her reaction to lack of discipline. Well, maybe that'll keep her out of my hair for a while... and let her cool off for a while.  
_

* * *

The _Archangel._ A ship that had, time and again, been forced to rely on its own resources, either cut off from higher authority, or else in a state of mutiny. They'd thought that utter lack of support over two years previously, when they joined Uzumi Nara Athha at Orb; even after the loss of the nation, the Orb warship _Kusanagi_ had been there to aid them.

Now they'd fled even Orb, and committed a crime that Orb's leaders would not forgive, or forget.

Kevin Walker, former baron of Orb and current freelance super-soldier, was perhaps the most uncomfortable of any of them at the moment. Not only were they two hundred meters underwater, but they had also just kidnapped Cagalli Yula Athha from her own wedding. He'd had no intention of intervening himself, and acted only to prevent Orb forces from shooting down his best friend's mobile suit... but he didn't expect Cagalli herself to see it that way.

Not after they way they'd last parted.

Clad in black, adjusting his shades with one hand and nervously twirling a revolver around his right index finger, Kevin walked slowly to the _Archangel_'s Bridge, his combat boots making a steady, almost rhythmic pounding against the deck. He knew Cagalli and Kira had already entered the Bridge, and, though he kept his empathic sense closed down -he really didn't want to know exactly what was waiting for him- he could already picture the scene that awaited him.

"Are you all out of your minds?" Cagalli demanded, on the other side of the hatch leading to the Bridge. "How _dare_ you -_any_ of you- do what you've just done? You've just kidnapped me from my own wedding, caused millions in damages by shooting down over a dozen Murasames, endangered the treaty-"

"We didn't have any choice," Kira cut in, not flinching from his sister's tirade. "Not even Kevin could talk you out of it, so we had to take matters into our own hands. I... I couldn't let you do something as foolish as that, Cagalli."

"Why do you call that foolish?" she retorted, ignoring her own earlier misgivings about the whole idea. "What's so foolish about the situation in Orb, or the decisions I've made?"

He sighed. "Cagalli... do you honestly believe that you were doing the right thing? That allying with the Atlantic Federation and the rest of the Earth Alliance, and marrying Yuna Roma Seiran, would help any? Do you really believe that was the right thing to do?"

"It was the only way to keep Orb safe," Cagalli snapped. "To prevent history repeating itself. Do you want to see Orb burn the way it did two years ago?"

The Bridge hatch snapped open. "Are you really that stupid?" Kevin demanded, walking in with more determination than he'd expected to have in this meeting. "Did being around Yuna really atrophy your brain that much? There are _far_ better ways of protecting Orb!"

She rounded on him. "I didn't think _you'd_ have the gall to show up," she flared. "And to claim there's a better way... _You,_ of all people. What have you done for Orb lately, besides fire on our people in a fit of jealousy-"

_ CRACK._

Even Murrue and Kira were taken aback as Kevin's left hand lashed out, slapping her across the face. "First of all," he said, eyes frigid behind his shades, "I had _nothing_ to do with Kira's actions out there. I had no idea of his intentions until he launched, and even then all I did was make sure you didn't get _hurt_ when those idiot pilots started shooting. I didn't arrive until _after_ Kira had already picked you up. And second... do you actually think I was going to abandon Orb completely? Oh, sure, _I_ didn't intend to have anything more to do with it... but blast it, Cagalli, what the devil do you think I've been building up Prometheus for? You think that I need a private army just to protect _myself?_ Listen to me: if I were only concerned with myself, Nemesis and _Dominion-_ and the new Foxhound- would be perfectly adequate. There's not a thing in this world that can stand up to those for very long. But no, I've also been building a number of other new weapons... for use against the Earth Alliance, and, if necessary, ZAFT. Because while I've no real love for any country, no loyalty to any government, I wasn't about to let Orb fall, either."

Cagalli took an involuntary step back, stunned by the tirade... and the slap. In all the years they'd known each other, she'd had to shoot him once, and deck him on another occasion, but he had _never_ laid a hand on her before. Not _once_ had he resorted to blows, even in their last, bitter argument. "Kevin... I..."

"Forget it," Kevin said in disgust. "Murrue, I'll be below if you need me; Nemesis needs a tune-up, and I need to make sure everything's ready to receive _Concepcion_'s shipment."

"Ah... right..." Murrue said to his retreating back, still more than a little shell-shocked herself. "I'll bear that in mind..."

Kira turned to his sister. "Look, Cagalli," he said softly, "you need to understand how badly you hurt him. That's not how he really feels about you; he's just been wounded, more than he has been in a long time... maybe the worst he's ever been hurt, emotionally. He's just... going through a hard time. But... he was right, too, you know."

Cagalli sighed. "Kira, I..."

"You can get past this," he said encouragingly. "If you don't wait too long, you can still repair what you've done... and lost. Here," he added, holding out the ring Kevin had given her years before, and she had given up, lest Yuna dispose of it entirely.

Cagalli stared at it, as Kira slipped it back onto her finger... and it was too much. The enormity of what she'd done, and nearly lost forever, came crashing down on her, and she collapsed into her brother's arms, sobbing.

* * *

_ Orb... feels like a long time since I last saw it,_ Athrun Zala thought, banking the Savior into a turn toward the islands. _Weird sentiment, though, for a guy who never even set foot on the _planet_ until three years ago..._

As he approached, though, something was bothering him. He wasn't sure what, but something seemed... out of place, as he activated his radio. "Attention, Orb," he called, "this is Alex Dino, requesting permission to land at _Minerva_'s dock."

Athrun waited for over two minutes, but there was no response. None at all... which struck him as more than a little ominous. _It's not like them to just ignore transmissions completely,_ he thought, gently guiding Savior in for a closer look. _Did something happen while I was gone? Wait a second... what do they think they're _doing?

Ahead, a pair of Murasame's were rising into the sky in mobile armor mode, and they didn't look anything like an escort. In fact, his trained military mind instantly recognized their heading as an intercept course... the sort usually associated with blowing up unfriendly strangers.

As they approached, someone finally deigned to talk to him; a Murasame pilot, from the transmission codes. "Retreat at once," the pilot said without preamble. "ZAFT is now our enemy; continue, and you'll be fired upon."

Athrun blinked in surprise; this wasn't at all what he was expecting. "I'm Alex Dino," he repeated, and gave out a series of authentication codes he'd learned as Cagalli's bodyguard. "I'd like to speak with Chief Representative Athha-"

_ "That won't be possible,"_ a new voice cut in, and an Orb official appeared on Savior's com screen. He didn't look very friendly; in fact, he looked very hostile, indeed, as though Athrun were a known enemy. _"And that's a pretty flimsy excuse to get in range for an attack, considering that _Minerva_ left days ago. All pilots,"_ he added, _"if the ZAFT mobile suit doesn't retreat within the next ten seconds, open-"_

"I suggest you belay that order, Sir," another voice interrupted. "This is Lieutenant Commander Maxine Walker, Prometheus Fleet. I won't ask you to permit Dino entrance into Orb territory, but if you fire upon him, I assure you that you _will_ regret it."

Out of seemingly thin air, a mobile suit wavered into existence as its hyper jammers deactivated; Athrun recognized it as the machine he'd caught a glimpse of weeks before, aiding Kevin's Sturm Vogel. And that voice... "Max?"

"Affirmative," she replied, her mobile suit turning to glance at his. "'Maxine Walker' is my legal name now; long story. Look, I'll cover you if anything happens, but I think you really should get out of here. Orb isn't safe for any of us anymore."

"Roger that." Athrun brought Savior around in a sharp turn, ignoring the consternation Max's arrival had caused in Orb itself. "Mind telling me what's going on?"

Max shook her head. "Sorry, but it's a long story, and I need to get moving myself; got a rendezvous to make." She tilted her head, eyes narrow. "Speaking of long stories, I imagine the one behind you being in a ZAFT mobile suit is another one?"

"Yeah," he acknowledged. "And... don't mention it to Kevin yet, okay? Given the way he feels about ZAFT, I'd rather explain this in person, without him forming any preconceptions."

She nodded. "Probably a good idea, assuming you _do_ have a good reason for this. Kevin's not exactly known for being open-minded about ZAFT... and he's really not happy with them right now." The ex-AI grimaced. "Word of advice, Athrun: speak softly, and _don't_ carry a big stick next time you see him." And with that cryptic message, she reactivated her hyper jammers, and vanished from sight.

Athrun frowned. "What on earth is going on here?" he wondered aloud, turning to head toward Carpentaria Base, _Minerva_'s most likely destination. "Why is Orb so hostile right now... and what's got Kevin so worked up about ZAFT again...?"

* * *

Evening on the _Archangel._ Ordinarily, Kevin Walker would've found it soothing -years of covert operations had taught him that the night was his friend- but on this particular evening, peace eluded him. That was why he stood in the deserted hangar, insulated from the water by over a dozen meters of open space in all directions.

Before him stood one of his masterpieces, the mobile suit that had served him faithfully for nearly three years now. Designed by his father, its "Beta" form was Kevin's own brainchild, with power exceeding even its original frame. Even more than Stormhawk, the Nemesis was tailored for him and him alone, controlled primarily through neural interfacing and powered by a reactor only he could truly keep stable under combat conditions.

Nemesis was born to fight; as was Kevin himself, in the final analysis. A soldier first and foremost, who fought to live and lived to fight. Without someone to protect, he was a potential loose warhead, with nothing keeping him in check but his own peculiar honor code, and flexible ethics; only a handful of people could reign him in when necessary... and one of them had rejected him.

Kevin wondered, sometimes, if Cagalli realized exactly what it was that she'd done. By casting him out, she'd set loose the Crimson Tiger, with his implacable grudge against the Earth Alliance and Blue Cosmos still in full force. Yet even doing so, she hadn't even realized that, even as an exile, he kept watch over Orb, doing what he could from a distance... or so the plan had been, before his reason for protecting Orb had been spirited away to the _Archangel._

Now they were together on the same ship again... and Kevin honestly wasn't sure where that would lead. Their current estrangement _couldn't_ last; not if they wanted to stay sane. _Archangel_ had been lengthened by nearly one hundred meters during her refit, but that still wasn't enough space for them to avoid each other completely... particularly since they'd doubtless both be spending a great deal of time on the Bridge. When Cagalli came to grips with her current situation, as Kevin was sure she would, she'd be a part of the planning sessions among the senior officers... as would Kevin himself. He didn't like to lead, but he acknowledged the necessity from time to time. After all, he _was_ a student of the Desert Tiger.

He was still staring up at his mechanical henchman, his robotic other half, when he heard light footfalls coming up behind him. Even without identifying the distinctive tread, he knew who it was. Their connection was subtler than the one he shared with Kira, but there was undeniably a link between the two of them. They'd spent far too long together, in years past, for that not to be the case.

Nevertheless, Kevin didn't say a word, or even acknowledge her presence, for several moments, so Cagalli was forced to gently clear her throat, and speak up first. "...Hi, Kevin," she said tentatively.

"Hello, tovarisch," he answered quietly. "Didn't expect to see you down here... not just now, anyway."

She looked down at the deck. "Kevin... I'm sorry. What I did to Orb... No," she interrupted herself, "that's not right. What I almost did to Orb was bad enough, but what I did to you was even worse. I made the decision to sacrifice everything we'd experienced together, everything we _had_ together, because of Shinn Asuka's ranting and the Seirans' manipulations. They used me... and I let them, and in so doing hurt you very badly."

"Yes, you did," Kevin acknowledged. "I've suffered my share of betrayals over the years, but that was one I never expected."

Cagalli winced. "And you shouldn't have," she whispered. "Because I should never have let them do that to me. It took Kira interrupting my wedding for me to see the truth... to see what I'd have thrown away by saying those few words at the altar. I... I can't ask you to forgive me... but that doesn't mean I don't need to apologize to you. For everything."

Kevin finally turned, and pulled off his sunglasses. "Tovarisch," he said quietly, noting absently that she'd changed into civilian clothing (the same red t-shirt and khaki pants she'd worn two years before, in fact), "I won't deny that what you did hurt. In fact, I was about as furious as I've ever been; that's why I was so ready to pack up and leave Orb entirely. _But..._ I made my share of mistakes, too. I don't regret one thing that I did in the aftermath... except that it should've been me, not Kira, to head to that chapel." He held out his flesh and blood hand. "I won't say that it didn't hurt... but a month of animosity can't overcome the years we've been together."

Cagalli looked at the hand, and hesitantly took it... then sighed in relief as he pulled her into an embrace. At long last, things were right between them again... and that made facing the conflict to come just a little bit easier. _Even if we have to fight the entire world again,_ she thought, _at least we'll fight it together._ "I promise," she whispered. "I promise I'll never leave your side again..."

"I'll hold you to that. Just remember one thing," Kevin murmured in her ear. "The next time I see either Seiran, they're dog meat."

She chuckled. "Need some help? I think we can arrange for it to be called a 'summary execution', after all they've done."

"I don't care what you call it," Kevin told her. "I don't even care about public opinion anymore. I see either one of them, and I'll ventilate their brainpans."

* * *

_So this is Carpentaria Base,_ Shinn Asuka thought, meandering along the tarmac near the waters of Carpentaria Bay. _ZAFT's headquarters for operations on Earth… and one of the few places not even _he_ would dare to come to. At least, I don't _think_ he would…_

Looking out across the expanses of ships, airborne transports, and mobile suits, Shinn couldn't help but remember the tales from the war, about the soldier who had begun his career with ZAFT, then betrayed it, and fought against it with an implacable hatred unequaled by anything save the hate Blue Cosmos held for Coordinators. Alone, he did incalculable damage; when he became the Sword of the Four Ships Alliance, as the commanding officer of the Mobile Assault Ship _Dominion,_ he was truly an enemy to be feared.

And that same soldier had killed Shinn's family.

The knowledge that he'd fought alongside Kevin Walker willingly –almost gratefully, on more than one occasion- was a bitter taste in Shinn's mouth. Whether Walker himself had been aware that he'd done it –and he claimed not to know how it occurred, even though he did admit the shot had come from him- he was still the one responsible.

_And one day,_ Shinn Asuka thought, _he'll pay for what he's done._ Looking up at one of ZAFT's new mobile suit designs, the winged, transformable BABI, he thought that, just perhaps, it could actually be done. If the rest of ZAFT could hold off Walker's people, he was confident that he alone could take Kevin Walker in single combat. _After all, he's not the Freedom's pilot. He could tear me apart without breaking a sweat on foot, but when we're in mobile suits a lot of his edge will disappear. And then… Huh?_

He was startled out of his thoughts by the roar of unfamiliar verniers. Shinn had thought he'd known the sound of every mobile suit in ZAFT's inventory, but this one he couldn't place. As he looked out to sea, he realized that impression was correct; whatever that red mobile suit was, it wasn't anything he'd ever seen before. _One of the new Second Stage units? A fifth, which no one mentioned before?_

He wasn't the only who started running as the machine landed; he could see Meyrin and Lunamaria both heading off to see what was going on. After all, it wasn't every day that an unknown prototype turned up in full view of anyone who wanted to see.

As it descended, the machine twisted around, components shifting into a more conventional appearance as it converted from a winged mobile armor mode to a mobile suit, even as it slid neatly through the hatch into _Minerva_ herself. _Well, now we know that the machine's assigned to us,_ Shinn thought, joining the others at the hatch. _I wonder who the pilot is? They wouldn't have given that thing to just anybody._

Jogging through _Minerva_'s corridors, he and his comrades entered the hangar just in time to see the pilot descend to the deck. He wore a flightsuit of purple, with white trim; there was also a wing-like emblem on his chest, which Shinn puzzled over for a moment… before the pilot removed his helmet, revealing his face. _Wait a second. That's a FAITH emblem, and that pilot…!_

The others present –including the mechanics, among them Alec King- raised their hands in salute, which the pilot returned crisply… but Shinn wasn't so sanguine. "What are _you_ doing here?" he demanded of Athrun Zala.

Athrun shrugged. "As a friend of mine would probably say, my job, I guess. Anyway, is Captain Gladys on the Bridge? I need to speak with her."

"Yes, she is," Meyrin confirmed, smiling. "If you want, I'll-"

"I'll take you to the Bridge, Athrun," Lunamaria interrupted. "The elevator's over here, as you probably remember…"

Athrun nodded, and began to follow her… but as he did, Shinn spoke up one last time. "Does this mean you've returned to ZAFT, Athrun?"

The older pilot hesitated for a moment. "I guess it does. Why?"

"Just remember something: someday, I _will_ destroy the Nemesis." Shinn's gaze was cold, but he said nothing more. His point had been made.

Athrun looked at him in confusion, but he let it rest. _I'll ask Luna,_ he decided, _once we're out of earshot. Something about that sounded ominous…  
_

* * *

The morning after the wedding crash, Murrue noted with relief that Kevin and Cagalli came onto the Bridge together, just as in the old days. "I see you two are getting along better," she noted, smiling.

"You could say that," Kevin agreed. "We… talked last night, and cleared the air. Couldn't exactly stay as we were, considering the size of the ship; we'd all go mad."

"And I think it's safe to say it won't happen again," Cagalli said, squeezing his shoulder. "I've… learned how badly that course would've turned out; I won't make that mistake again."

"She couldn't, anyway," the super-soldier said with a thin smile. "The next time I see the Seirans, they'll be summarily executed for treason."

Andy, turning in his seat at the copilot's station, raised an eyebrow. "Is that legal?"

Kevin shrugged. "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges: Laws are silent in time of war. Even in a democracy, extraordinary measures are frequently taken in wartime. Besides," he added, eyes cold, "I know perfectly well that neither of them would ever see trial. Their influence as members of a Noble Family of Orb would see to that. For those that justice cannot reach, there is a need for… those who can reach where the law can't."

"A need for the Angel of Death," Kira said softly, stepping onto the Bridge behind them. "That's what you mean, isn't it, Kevin?"

The sandy-haired soldier turned to meet his gaze levelly. "Are you going to tell me that Azrael didn't need to die? Or Le Creuset?"

Kira slowly shook his head. "No, I'm not. I won't question your judgment now, Kevin; I know you'd never deliberately kill the innocent… and after that night, I think I understand you a little better."

Cagalli looked at them in confusion. "After that night?" she repeated. "Do you mean when all hell broke loose on Izanagi? Just what _happened_ that night, anyway?"

"The mansion came under attack by what we presume to have been a ZAFT special forces unit," Andy explained. "They came in with twenty-four regular grunts… and two of Arkanian's new Destroyers. They… hurt Lacus, before Kevin and Hyperion got them."

She gasped. "Lacus was hurt? I… I wondered why I didn't see her when I came onboard, but I didn't realize…"

"She'll live," Kevin reassured her, "but it was the last straw. Hyperion tore Mongoose –one of Arkanian's goons- apart with particle-beam fire, and I broke Meerkat in half. Then we found out they had a team of six mobile suits, new ASH amphibious models, preparing to finish us off. That was when Kira launched."

Kira nodded soberly. "I… wasn't feeling very merciful," he confessed. "I destroyed all six machines… completely."

"Good!" Cagalli said firmly. "If ZAFT's attacked you, and nearly killed Lacus, I would've done the same thing. If you're feeling bad about it, Kira, stop it. They brought it on themselves."

"I know," her brother acknowledged. "I also know that I couldn't afford to let them get any farther… or escape."

"Though there _was_ one problem with that solution," Murrue noted. "We don't know for sure who actually ordered the attack."

Kevin grimaced. "That's true. There are only two candidates, given the presence of Destroyers, but unfortunately Durandal is quite capable of ordering a strike without consulting Arkanian, and she's just as capable of ordering _me_ killed without asking permission first. All depends on which of them wants Lacus and me dead just now, and it's really hard to say without further intelligence."

"How do you get that intelligence?" Cagalli asked. "Talk to Yzak or Dearka, maybe?"

He shook his head. "No good; Durandal and Arkanian both know those two have ties to me, so neither would let either of those pilots in on it. No, I'm going to have to try and find out directly. In fact… we'll soon be receiving my means of entering ZAFT territory without much risk of destruction."

Murrue glanced at him. "Foxhound, you mean?"

"Exactly." Kevin stepped to the communications station, tapped a few keys, and cleared his throat. _"Concepcion,_ this is Walker. Report status."

"_Approaching rendezvous point, Sir,"_ Captain Daniels replied. _"I trust _Archangel_ will be meeting us on schedule? I really don't want to spend too much time down here."_

"Affirmative. We're about an hour from your position. Prepare Foxhound for transfer to _Archangel."_

"_Roger that… Wait, what's going on? Lieutenant, get an ID on those mobile suits! Where did they come from?"_

Murrue looked over her shoulder in alarm. "Kevin, what's happening?"

Kevin shook his head, concerned. "I don't know. Daniels, status report!"

"_Incoming bandits, Sir,"_ Daniels replied, clearly distracted. _"They came out of nowhere; can't get an ID on their type, but they're coming in fast- They're firing on us!"_

Kevin stared down at the communications display. "Daniels!"

"_Can't return fire,"_ Daniels was saying, _"we've got nothing to shoot _with._ Engines damaged… They're boarding us! Captain Walker, cancel rendezvous! We can't hold! Repeat, cancel-!"_

The transmission cut off abruptly, leaving nothing but silence in its wake. "What the devil just happened?" Kevin demanded. "Jackie, is there anything on radar or thermal?"

"Negative," Tonomura replied, after a quick check of his instruments. "We had _Concepcion_'s signal for a few moments, but we lost it right after the transmission; and we didn't get _anything_ from whatever was attacking them."

"_Nichevo!"_ the super-soldier exploded. "That is _not_ good!"

Cagalli looked at him in confusion. "I don't understand, Kevin. What just happened?"

"_Concepcion_ was carrying a shipment of weapons," Murrue explained, while Kevin struggled with his temper. "Mostly new anti-Destroyer weaponry, since we have proof that ZAFT's restarted ABADDON. I believe there was also some new medical gear among the cargo; but the most important thing was…"

"MBF-X15A/M Foxhound," Kevin finished, throttling his temper ruthlessly through formidable self-control and judicious application of chemicals from his pharmacopoeia. "The second of the new A/M series mobile suits we've been developing at Artemis. Like Nemesis, it has the raw power to obliterate a space colony with one shot… and it has several features Nemesis lacks, like a new Colloid-based propulsion system, and improved beam shield technology."

"And now someone seems to have stolen it," Andy put in. "Judging from the remark about boarding. Is that as bad as I think it is, Racher?"

"Yes," his protégé said grimly, "it is. Let's assume, for the moment, that ZAFT was behind that attack. If so, they now have in their possession a machine more powerful than Stormhawk ever was… and since I have no idea where they'll take it, they'll be able to study it at their leisure. That means they can, in theory, duplicate _everything_ used on Prometheus' next-generation machines. The hyper jammers, the buster rifles, the antimatter power… all of it. The only silver lining is that Foxhound's database is incomplete; they'll have to reverse-engineer everything -which will take time - and they don't have access to data on the _Prometheus_-class, the Morgan, or the location of Artemis itself." He was about to say more, but a sudden, coughing fit seized him, and he doubled over in pain.

"Kevin!" Cagalli quickly reach out to him, catching hold of his shoulder. "Kevin, what's wrong?"

"Solkin syn… not now…" Still coughing, Kevin's cybernetic hand darted into his jacket's inside pocket, caught hold of an injector, and yanked it out. Cursing up a storm –in three different languages- he jabbed it into his carotid artery.

The coughing began to subside, and with it the pain that doubled him over, and Murrue stood and moved to his side. "It's called Snake Eater," she said quietly to Cagalli. "We discovered it a few weeks before you made your trip to Armory One. Apparently, it's a genetic failsafe, engineered into Kevin's DNA before his birth, in case he should fail at whatever task it was that Baron Onishi intended him for. We don't know exactly how it was triggered, but evidently Onishi finally decided Kevin had outlived his usefulness only recently… only weeks before he murdered Frank Castile, in fact."

Cagalli paled. "So this… _this_ the virus you mentioned the day you decided to leave Orb, Kevin? And… it was your _father_ who killed Frank? But… but _why?_

"That's something we can't know for sure as of yet," Kevin replied, straightening in relief. "My father is even more devious than I am, so it's hard to say exactly what he's up to; the fate of _Amaterasu_ further complicates things, since we've no idea how or why she was a shattered derelict when we found her. Still, we've got an unpleasant suspicion that he wants to rule Orb… that I was created for that very purpose. And when he finally decided that I wasn't going to carry out that mission, even by marrying you, he chose to get rid of me. Where he is now, and what he's doing, we don't know… and that scares me."

It was an unusual admission from the young soldier; very rarely would he admit to being afraid of _anything._ But his father was still an unknown factor…

Mir interrupted the momentary silence that had filled the Bridge. "Captain… we've got two incoming unit transponders. One of them looks to be a ZAFT mobile suit, and the other…" She paused. "The other is broadcasting a Skygrasper IFF."

Murrue's eyebrows went up. "A Skygrasper? Then that must be…"

"…Natarle and John," Kevin finished, and he glanced over at Cagalli. "We had no idea where those two disappeared to after the war, but they took my old Skygrasper with them for transportation and protection. If they're here… something must've happened to them, too. Otherwise they'd have headed for space as soon as they received the Code Himmelkrieg alert." He looked down at Mir. "What about the mobile suit? Do you recognize it?"

She frowned, typing. "It _is_ in our database," she said at last. "One of the new Second Stage ZAFT models, in fact. Kevin… it's the Impulse, or at least _an_ Impulse. Wait," she added, before he could respond. "Getting a transmission from the Skygrasper."

"_This is Lieutenant Commander John Tyler, Prometheus Fleet, calling the _Archangel," the Bridge speakers said. _"I've got Natarle in the backseat with me; requesting permission to land. We were attacked yesterday by clones, from Carter's little army."_

Kevin bristled. "Glad to hear from you, John; and you're cleared to land. Sounds like we've got a lot to talk about… like how to track down Carter and kill him. And speaking of things to talk about, who's flying that mobile suit?"

"_It's Flay,"_ John replied. _"And yes, it's a long story. Anyway, Carter stole that Impulse unit a few months ago, apparently, and was studying it when things went sour. We won't be killing him, though, or tracking him down… because he's in the cockpit with Flay, badly wounded. He wasn't responsible for the attack, either; as near as we can tell, they tried to kill him before they came for us, and he came after them, despite his wounds, in an attempt to stop them."_ He sighed. _"Look, Boss, I think there's something very wrong going on. Dad's mixed up in all this, and it's starting to look like ZAFT may be too."_

"Solkin syn," Kevin said again. "Alright, John, you guys get aboard; I guess we've got a devil of a mess to figure out. _Archangel_ out."

Murrue sighed. "Just when we start to think we've got most of the situation figured out, something else has to come up."

"Sounds like we've got a _real_ hydra on our hands," Andy remarked. "Solve one problem, and fifteen more take its place, eh, Racher?"

Kevin closed his eyes. "Story of my life," he muttered. "Wonder how many people have to die _this_ time before we can put an end to this madness." _Because for all that I can kill without a second thought… it's gone on long enough. I've got so much blood on my hands already… I just want it to _end…

* * *

Lunamaria was still in a state of confusion as she and Athrun rode the elevator up to _Minerva_'s Bridge. "I still don't understand," she said. "Why were you suddenly recalled to ZAFT? I thought you'd left for good, at the end of the last war…"

Athrun took his time replying to that. _It's… complicated,_ he thought. "Well," he said slowly, "I wasn't exactly 'recalled'. I went up to the PLANTs to meet with Chairman Durandal, and in the course of the discussion he brought up the idea of my returning to ZAFT, to perform the same sort of role I did two years ago. In the end… I decided he was right. That's about all there is to it." He tilted his head. "What _I_ want to know is, when did _Minerva_ leave Orb? I hadn't heard about it."

She shrugged. "A few days ago. We got a warning… from Captain Walker. He came to the ship, and told Captain Gladys it would be better if we left soon, so we did." She raised her eyebrows. "So, what happened when _you_ returned to Orb?"

He grimaced. "I was attacked. Seems they thought I was just using the _Minerva_ as an excuse to attack _them…_ Anyway, they didn't have a chance to really do anything; one of Kevin's subordinates turned up, and forced them to turn back."

Luna shook her head. "Orb really is a strange place… Fact is, Walker's warning came a little too late. As soon as we left Orb's waters, the Earth Forces ambushed us. Shinn's incredible flying that day is the only reason we're still alive." She sighed. "I'm really disappointed in Chief Representative Athha, you know. Allying with the Earth Forces, and marrying that Seiran guy…"

Athrun stared at her, shocked. "Orb actually allied with the Earth Alliance?" he demanded. "And Cagalli… she married _him?"_ _This isn't good,_ he thought. _Kevin must've gone into orbit… no wonder Max was flying around in plain sight._

"Yeah, they signed the treaty," Luna confirmed, "and Lady Cagalli did marry Seiran… I think. There's apparently some question about that; rumor has it that she was kidnapped before vows were exchanged." She paused. "The rumors also say Nemesis was involved in the incident."

Athrun frowned. "Nemesis? That's the second time I've heard the word since I got here, and frankly I have no idea what you're talking about. Shinn said he'd destroy Nemesis… but what _is_ it?"

She looked at him in surprise. "You mean you don't know? MBF-M1000B Nemesis… that's how the IFF identified it. According to Kyle Alexander, one of our mechanics, it looks to be some kind of 'Beta' version of the old Stormhawk. It… it's Kevin Walker's personal mobile suit. He never said a word about it?"

He shook his head. "No; but he wouldn't have, either. Until recently, I had no idea _any_ of his old weapons were still around, let alone that he'd been improving them. But… what does this have to do with Shinn? Why is he so intent on killing Kevin?"

Luna looked away. "Nemesis was involved in our escape from Orb," she said quietly. "He turned up early on, firing what I think was a positron beam into the ocean to discourage the Orb fleet from firing on us. Then he helped out Shinn against the enemy mobile suits… until Nemesis fired its buster rifle. Shinn… he attacked Nemesis then. The battle was brief, though; about a minute in, Walker destroyed Shinn's saber, and forced him to back off."

That illuminated matters slightly, but Athrun felt he was still missing something. "But why did he attack Kevin in the first place? I mean, I know he doesn't like Orb nobles, but-"

"Walker killed Shinn's family," Luna said bluntly. "Two and a half years ago, it was _his_ machine that fired that shot. There's no doubt about it; only Walker ever fired blue beams." She met Athrun's gaze challengingly. "That's two families Walker's hurt, Athrun. _At least_ two. I don't know about you, but I'm starting to think Shinn might be right about him. I don't think he's a deliberate murderer, but he may well be a menace."

_So that's it… Shinn fights for the same cause Kevin did, so many times before. They're alike… and yet very different…_

Athrun sighed. "Luna," he said quietly, "I won't deny that Kevin's killed a lot of people. He'd be the first to admit it; he'd also be the first to admit that he regrets a lot of the things he's done in the past. Nonetheless, as far as anyone -including himself- knows, those two incidents are the _only_ times he's killed by accident, or without cause. He's a little too fond of vengeance, but he's not some indiscriminate vigilante, either. He knows what he's doing… and he regrets ABADDON more than any of us can ever know."

Luna turned away. "Say what you want, Athrun. Maybe it's even the truth… but I don't ever want to see Nemesis on the battlefield again. If you see Walker again, tell him we don't need his kind of 'help'."

Athrun shook his head. "He won't listen to me, Luna. My presence here will anger him enough as it is; he won't comply if I ask him not to fight. The only person who _could_ get him to do that is Cagalli… and I don't think she'd be willing to ask him that right now."

She snorted. "Then he'd better watch his step. Shinn's a better pilot than you know, Athrun."

"He won't be better than Kevin. Kevin's a ground soldier by original training, but he fought me to a standstill while I was flying Aegis and he was in a modified GINN; in his new machine, none of ZAFT's Second Stage mobile suits could bring him down."

Luna wasn't particularly concerned. "Like I said, Athrun, Shinn's a better pilot than you know. If anyone can bring down the Black Asp, he can."

* * *

_Well,_ Kevin thought, stepping into _Archangel_'s Infirmary, _this is certainly a… unique reunion. I always knew I attracted weird events, but this is definitely one of the weirdest. Good thing we expanded the Infirmary when we added the extra ninety meters…_

Lacus was the first to speak, as the group gathered inside. Still confined to the sickbed, she was nonetheless looking much better than she had the day before. "Cagalli! It's good to see you again. Is everything…?"

Cagalli smiled. "Everything's fine now, Lacus. Kevin and I… we talked, and now we're both okay again." Her expression turned to one of concern, taking in all the arcane medical gear her friend was hooked up to. "How are _you_ feeling?"

"Better," Lacus assured her. "I… I don't remember much, except for the pain, but I know it could've been a lot worse." She smiled crookedly. "I don't normally say things like this, but… you should see the other guy."

Cagalli blinked at the uncharacteristic remark, and turned to look at Kevin. His reaction was slightly sheepish, but mostly satisfied. "Broke the vnyebrachnyi's back," he said simply. "Drained my energy reserves and knocked myself out in the process, but it was worth it."

"And Hyperion took care of the other one," Kira noted. "Particle beams; there wasn't really anything left afterwards." He started to say more, then broke off as four more people entered the compartment.

John Tyler, still in armor -save for the helmet- had the inert form of Jack Carter slung over his shoulders; behind him, Natarle Badgiruel and Flay Allster carried a red-furred wolfman in ninja gear. Both unconscious men were laid on bunks, and John turned to the man he was cloned from. "We got a real problem on our hands, Boss," he said without preamble. "Big time trouble."

Kevin sighed. "Why can my problems never be simple? We'll get to that in a minute, John. Flay, it's good to see you again." He reached out to grip his friend's -and former communications officer- arm.

"We were starting to think you were dead, Flay," Kira added. "What happened?"

Flay shrugged. "Would you believe Carter kidnapped me to save my life?"

"Only if the sky is tangerine," Cagalli said dryly, "and last I checked, it wasn't."

The redhead shook her head with a smile; the two of them hadn't gotten along at first, but the last two months of the war, spending so much time on the same ship, had cleared up their differences long since. "It's the truth, actually. He learned that Blue Cosmos intended to assassinate me the moment I entered Atlantic Federation territory, so he moved first, and took me to his base." Another shrug. "I can't say I _liked_ being held a virtual prisoner for two years, but given the alternative…"

"Quite," Kevin agreed. "But… how did you escape? I'm guessing Carter himself didn't arrange that; though I'm fairly sure he didn't exactly intend to be a patient in our infirmary, either."

"Dad's work, Kevin," John told him. "As near as we can figure, from the files Flay downloaded and some inferences from the attack on our home, Dad got into contact with Carter about six months ago. Carter wasn't too happy about it, but he didn't see anything he could do about it just then, so he played along when Dad started making noises about joining to forces to kill us off. It doesn't look like Carter intended to go through with it -in fact, I'm fairly sure he was intending to kill Dad at the earliest opportunity- but… well, it looks like Dad had other ideas." He grimaced. "As near as we can tell, one of Carter's clones -someone called 'Benedict'- awakened earlier than intended, without anyone noticing; probably with Dad's help."

"And they took over," Natarle put in, straightening from checking the wolfman's vital signs. "Your father, and all of Carter's clones. According to Flay's data, most of them have the intellectual capacity of attack dogs, but some are a bit smarter than that, and Benedict is like you with a moral lobotomy."

"Could be worse," a weak voice said. "At least… my people built genetic timers into them, to limit their lifespans…"

Kevin's head snapped around to where Carter lay. The clone, looking nearly identical to himself –he lacked only the scar bisecting his face- was also looking haggard, but conscious at last. "Hm," the super-soldier murmured. "The villain speaks. Care to give me a reason not to finish the job I started the day you cost me my arm?"

Carter laughed weakly. "Believe it or not, Walker, I'm _not_ the villain of this piece. This time, I'm just as much a target as you are."

"So I gather. Mind explaining just what happened?"

The clone sat up painfully. "Pretty much just what those guys just told you. I made some plans, they backfired, now I'm here at your mercy… and with a common enemy." His glowing jade eyes met Kevin's own. "I'm willing to declare a truce, Walker; your megalomaniac of a father is after us both now, and maybe more than that; and believe it or not, I really do care a little about the world. I don't want some crackpot like him ending up in charge of _anything."_

Kevin merely watched him for several moments, and Kira could sense the rapid-fire calculations occurring in the soldier's brain. (_It might be a good idea, Kevin,_) he suggested silently. (_You have to admit, even you could use some help against your father… and this might be a chance to end this feud with Carter._)

(_I could also end it by introducing him to my friend, Mr. Colt,_) Kevin pointed out.

(_Except,_) Kira riposted, (_that I thought you had enough blood on your hands. I can accept that you'll use deadly force in battle… but can't you take the chance, just this once, that you might not even have to fight someone? That you can end it right here, without more violence?_)

(_…Kira, you do a very good job of being a prosthetic conscience, you know that?_) Kevin sighed inwardly. (_Fine. But if he tries anything funny…_) He didn't have to finish the sentence.

He looked back at his clone. "All right," he said reluctantly. "Truce. However… there's one thing I want to know first." He nodded at the other comatose body. "Who's that wolfman, and just what did you do to the poor fellow?"

"According to database," John said, before Carter could reply, "he's a certain annoying DINN pilot you once fought, in the desert of Africa."

Kevin frowned. "A DINN in Africa? Wait a second…"

Carter chuckled. "That's right, Walker. That wolfman is Evan Bitter. ZAFT scooped him up after the battle, and stuffed him into cryo; they couldn't figure out what to do with him, since he wasn't quite dead but wasn't much more than burnt meat, either, so they left him that way for a while. When I took over the _Tesla,_ I snatched him at the same time, and the scientists I recruited got to work rebuilding him with experimental therapies." He grimaced. "I also had him turned into a manmade zoanthrope, figuring I could use him against you sometime. Didn't work out as planned, though; he transforms randomly, and doesn't keep control of his intellect when he does."

"So now he's a psychopathic half-zoanthrope, huh?" Kevin shook his head. "Real nice, Carter. And all these efforts were intended to kill me?"

The clone grimaced. "Originally. As I said, it backfired, and now I'm willing, however reluctantly, to work with you, at least long enough to take care of your father and my renegade pets."

"What forces do you still have under your control?" Cagalli asked.

Carter shrugged. "Just _D'Artangan_ and the Justice, unfortunately. Everything else was either taken by Onishi or destroyed in the fighting." He glanced over at Flay. "You can keep that Impulse, by the way. I… I owe you. I probably could've handled things better, these last two years." The clone looked very uncertain of himself now; Kira, for one suspected that Carter was feeling very out of his depth, embroiled in a situation that challenged everything he'd believed over his short existence.

Kevin might've -unwillingly- sympathized with him, given his own past, but he had other matters on his mind. "Actually, Flay, I think you could do better than that. With your permission, I'd like to see both you and it up to Artemis; there's a program underway right now that might interest you."

Flay blinked. "Um… thank you, Kevin. I will." Her resolve firmed up. "This time, I want to do more than sit at a Bridge station. I've found that I can fight, and I'll continue to do so until the war, and the threat from your father, is over."

"Great. You'll be meeting a woman named Leona Colde up there, more than likely; pay attention to what she has to tell you. Ex-Next-Generation Special Forces, she's as tough as they come… and about to be tougher, if everything is on schedule." Kevin turned toward his executive officer and fire-control operator. "Natarle, John, I want you two to… Huh?" His sharp eyes caught the glint of metal on Natarle's right ring finger, and it was his turn to blink. "Uh… is that what I think it is?"

She smiled, a little self-conscious. "Yes, Captain, it is. Over a year now, in fact."

The super-soldier closed his eyes. "Today just keeps getting weirder and weirder…"

"But in a good way," Lacus retorted with a smile. "At least, this news is. Wouldn't you agree, Brother?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I guess I would." Kevin shook his head. "Still boggles the mind, but… congratulations, you two."

John nodded. "Thanks, Boss. Now… how about we fill each other in on _exactly_ what's going on?"

* * *

"Athrun Zala, reporting, Captain," Athrun said, saluting. He, along with Talia Gladys and Arthur Trine, was on _Minerva_'s Bridge; Luna had quietly departed as soon as they arrived, believing the meeting to be none of her business and needing more time to think about the soldier who'd killed Shinn's family… and her sister.

"Welcome aboard, Athrun," Talia said, returning the salute. "I honestly never expected to see you back aboard, let alone in ZAFT uniform, but it's good to see you." She nodded at an envelope the blue-haired pilot held in his free hand. "I suppose those are our latest orders?"

Athrun nodded. "Yes, Ma'am." He handed them over.

She opened the envelope, and quickly scanned over the information within. "Hm…" she said at last. "Well, there's confirmation of our earlier orders, to prepare to take Commander Arkanian aboard as a 'special operative' of some kind, and… Well, well. It seems I'm being promoted to FAITH, as well."

Trine blinked at that. "Two FAITH members on one ship? That's a little… unusual, isn't it, Ma'am?"

"A little," Talia admitted. "It gives us greater operational flexibility, though, and that's not a bad thing. Also… we're being ordered to Gibraltar, with a submarine force, to assist in the attack on Eurasia's Suez base."

Athrun frowned. "Why there, I wonder?"

"Not all of Eurasia was happy about joining the Earth Alliance in the first place," she explained. "And Break The World was, basically, the last straw. As soon as the war began, member nations began to secede from the Federation. Therefore, Gibraltar is ours again… so we need to protect it."

He nodded slowly. "Makes sense… I wouldn't be surprised, though, if we ran into some of Kevin's people out there. He has connections to both Serpent Tail and the mercenary group 'X'; one of his fellows is also from Eurasia, originally."

"Leona Colde, yes; French, if I remember the records right." Talia shrugged. "Well, if Captain Walker's people do appear, it's nothing to worry about. The impression I got was that he's more concerned with the Earth Forces than ZAFT this time."

"Probably," Athrun agreed. "Speaking of Kevin, though… what exactly happened in Orb? Luna said something about Cagalli being kidnapped…"

"It looks that way, yes," Talia acknowledged. _"Something_ caused a ruckus in Orb not long ago; and there's been no sign of her in broadcasts since. You may be interested to know that rumor has it that it was _Archangel_ and the Freedom that pulled it off, possibly with assistance from the Nemesis."

His eyes widened in surprise. "I didn't know either of those were still around… but I guess I shouldn't be surprised, after everything Kevin's been doing lately."

"So it seems." She looked at him speculatively. "And what do _you_ think of this? A good sign… or a bad one?"

"It's good in at least one respect," Athrun said immediately. "If Cagalli's with the _Archangel,_ you won't have to worry so much about Kevin shooting everything in sight. They agree with each other a little too much for my piece of mind, sometimes, but she _will_ reign him in if he goes too far."

_Of course,_ he thought to himself, _she's also the source of his strength. As long as she's safe, and with him, he'll be something not even Shinn can handle. And if anyone _threatens_ her…_

Not for the first time, Athrun was glad _Minerva_ seemed unlikely to come into direct conflict with the _Archangel._ Given what he'd heard of Nemesis' firepower, the result of such a clash would probably be the Apocalypse.

* * *

Just outside the _Minerva,_ a certain brown-haired ex-mercenary paused, looking up at the ship, a duffel bag slung easily over one shoulder. _So,_ Arkanian mused, _there she is… the _Minerva_. Hm… I wonder if this ship is really is as important as the Chairman believes? I suppose we'll just have to find out, one way or the other._

She shook her head. The meeting with Durandal had been followed very shortly by the shuttle trip down to Earth, so, thanks to her tight schedule, she hadn't been able to go over matters with him as thoroughly as she'd preferred. Fortunately, he too had recognized that, and given her very simple instructions, as far as her wayward student was concerned. In essence, she was to act on her own discretion, and conduct the affair as she saw fit.

_That'll make it slightly easier to deal with Hydra… assuming he's even willing to talk after that imbecilic attack…_

Sighing, Arkanian stepped through the hatch, and saluted the guard standing watch just inside. "Commander Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, ZAFT Special Forces, requesting permission to join the ship's company."

The guard consulted a clipboard, then her face, before nodding in satisfaction and returning the salute. "Welcome aboard, Commander Arkanian. I believe Captain Gladys is expecting you on the Bridge; shall I have someone show you the way?"

She shook her head. "Thank you, but no need. I've been briefed on the layout, so you needn't go to any trouble on my account." Adjusting the duffel bag, she saluted once more, then strode deeper into the ship.

Delta's new mission had begun.

* * *

"So, what's the big deal about this 'FAITH' unit, anyway?" Vino Dupre wondered, sitting idly in _Minerva_'s crew lounge. "I mean, everybody's so excited because Athrun's in FAITH, and they just promoted the Captain into it, but I can't quite figure out why."

"You mean you don't know?" Yolant said by way of reply. "Well, it's like this. FAITH stands for 'Fast-Acting Integrated Tactical Headquarters'. They're the elite of the Special Forces; only the best end up in FAITH. More than that, only Chairman Durandal has the authority to appoint people into FAITH… and they answer only to him. That's another reason they're such a select group; they have to worry about the chance of someone abusing that authority."

"They're kind of ZAFT's equivalent to the private military groups Orb noble families sometimes have," Meyrin put in. "You know, like the private army the Sahaku family has… or the 'Prometheus Fleet' we've started hearing rumors about."

Vino nodded in sudden comprehension. "You mean Walker's forces, right? So FAITH is… what, the Chairman's personal troubleshooting squad?"

"Exactly," Yolant confirmed. "Something needs doing, and without any chain of command issues, you send in FAITH. That's probably why they promoted the Captain, and it's _gotta_ be why Athrun's a member."

"Just one thing, though," Vino said thoughtfully. "Athrun's a good friend of Walker, right? What happens if… if we come into conflict with the Nemesis, or Prometheus? Isn't that kind of a conflict of interest?"

Meyrin shook her head. "I don't think it would come to that, Vino. It's true, Walker's a wild card, but he also warned us to get out of Orb… and he came to our aid when he realized the warning came too late."

Yolant looked at her curiously. "You know… Luna doesn't sound that calm when she talks about Walker. I mean, didn't he…?"

She sighed. "Yes, Yolant, Walker did… kill our sister. But I don't think Luna's right to jump to conclusions about him. I know, we've all heard the stories about the Black Asp and his grudge against ZAFT, and the lengths he'll take his vengeance to. Still… look closer, and you'll see that all of his 'atrocities' were committed almost five years ago. There's no record, or even rumor, of anything outside the rules of war after the Crimson Tiger's last battles with Blue Cosmos, back in 70."

"But, ABADDON…" Vino said hesitantly. "And, Shinn's family…"

Meyrin shook her head again. "Vino, think about it. Chairman Durandal himself admits that ZAFT was responsible for the ABADDON incident; if we hadn't messed with his head five years ago, it wouldn't have happened at all. And Shinn's family… well, accidents happen in war. I mean, come on. Walker is a Baron of Orb, whether he likes to admit it or not. There's no _way_ he would've deliberately targeted Orb soil."

Vino was partly mollified by that, but Yolant wasn't so sure. "Maybe so… but what if it _does_ happen, Meyrin? Situations change, especially in a war. What if we _do_ fight Walker?"

Her expression, when she looked back at him, was grim. "Yolant, I was on the Bridge during that battle. If the Black Asp decided to destroy us, I don't think there's much we could do about it. Not with _Dominion_ backing him, at least. Nemesis and that ship… I wouldn't want to face both at once."

Considering the fates of Patrick Zala and Muruta Azrael, neither of her companions disputed the notion… much as they wished they could.

* * *

"I still don't understand why Chief Representative Athha would've actually consented to marry that Seiran guy," Luna mused, following Athrun through _Minerva_'s hangar. "I mean, I don't know all that much about Orb's nobility, but I can't imagine they'd have much in common."

Athrun shrugged, walking toward the Savior. "That's a question that's bothering me, too. They _don't_ have much in common; the closest connection I know of is the fact that Yuna Roma and Kevin have been fighting each other over Cagalli's affections for years. That ultimately led to Kevin breaking Yuna's jaw a few years ago… Another thing is that their families' policies are about as different as you can get. Before I left, I'd heard that the Seirans were pushing for that treaty; but last I heard, they were the only ones. Sahaku, Athha, and especially Onishi were against it."

"Yeah, that's what I thought. So… why?"

"I really don't know, Luna." He arrived at his destination, and stepped into Savior's cockpit. "Frankly, I was shocked when I heard about the wedding. Now, the very idea of Cagalli getting married wouldn't have surprised me all that much; it's just that I would've expected it to be to Kevin. That she'd end up with the man he hates the most, instead… Something big must've happened after I left."

"And then something even bigger after _we_ left," Luna mused. "The 'jealous boyfriend' angle?"

Athrun shook his head. "No. In the first place, Kevin doesn't act like that; he doesn't _like_ his position, but he understands that he needs to maintain appearances, if only for Cagalli's sake. More importantly, if he _had_ intended to do it, he and Cagalli would've been out of Orb even before you were. Kevin's a lot things, but indecisive isn't one of them. If he decides it has to be done, he just goes and does it, and forget the consequences."

"Yeah, that sounds like what I know of the guy…" As the blue-haired pilot tapped controls on Savior's instrument panel, Luna peered in curiously. "So this is the fifth Second Stage unit, huh? Is it anything like the Impulse or the stolen machines in there?"

He shrugged. "I wouldn't really know. I've never seen the cockpits of the other four units. It's more advanced than the Aegis, though, and the displays are even a little better than the Justice." He got out of the seat, and moved to one side. "See for yourself."

Hesitantly, she accepted the invitation, and settled carefully into the pilot's seat. "Wow," she breathed. "This is a lot different from my ZAKU, or any of the other New Millennium machines."

"More advanced," Athrun pointed out. "And I think some of the systems are also derived from data taken from Kevin's Stormhawk, when ZAFT recovered it three years ago…"

Passing through the hangar, only meters from them, Shinn glanced in, noted Luna listening attentively to Athrun… and kept on going, ignoring the pair completely.

* * *

On the Bridge, Talia turned just as the hatch opened, admitting a woman she hadn't seen in nearly six years. "Commander Arkanian," she breathed. "So, it _is_ you…"

Arkanian smiled, saluting. "Indeed, Captain. I see you've moved up in the world since I last saw you. Of course, that _was_ several years ago… I notice you've managed to avoid getting entangled in any of ABADDON's legacy since then."

"Until a few months ago," the younger woman replied, "I didn't know ABADDON even _had_ a legacy. As far as I knew, ABADDON's technology had died out with the original project; I'd no idea the NGSF was a part of that." She tilted her head. "I notice you've managed to stay completely out of the spotlight since those days. I thought you were dead."

The ex-mercenary shook her head. "Not dead, just busy. We've been spending the last six years trying to reconstruct what was lost that day… this time, without _any_ unwilling subjects. Oracle was featherhead who got eaten for his mistakes; we've no intention of repeating those mistakes this time."

Talia's eyes widened. "You're restarting the ABADDON program? I didn't know that."

"Not many do," Arkanian admitted. "Nor are they supposed to. We've already had two casualties, unfortunately –a botched operation I won't bother going into detail about- but so far, everything's proceeding smoothly."

From his post, Trine gave her a speculative glance. "I don't suppose this has anything to do with the reemergence of Hydra, does it?"

"Slightly," Delta acknowledged. "I don't anticipate him being an enemy, but if he does become one, only augmented soldiers can stand against him… and there's also an interesting pair of codenames we've been hearing of lately: 'Foxhound' -which seems to be a mobile weapon of some kind- and 'FOX'. We don't have any details at all about the latter, but the Chairman believes Hydra is assembling a special forces unit of his own… and we need to be able to counter whatever he's up to, if it _does_ become a threat."

Talia nodded slowly. "No wonder they brought you aboard. It's been years, but I vividly remember what happens when _that_ man fights at full capacity." She thought about it for a few moments, then shrugged. "Well, Commander, I guess I'll leave that in your hands. In the meantime, your arrival means we're ready to go." She looked toward the bow of the Bridge. "Malik, start up engines. _Minerva_ is moving out."

"Yes, Captain." Obediently, Malik Yardbirds tapped several commands into his console, then gripped the flight controls as he began to maneuver the big ship out of port.

_Minerva_ was heading for battle once again.

* * *

_Here we go again,_ Kevin thought, striding into _Archangel_'s hangar. _Hopefully I won't get shot at this time… though with Asuka involved, I wouldn't be surprised._

"So, you're really going out there?" Cagalli asked, joining him at Nemesis' foot. "Even though this battle has nothing to do with us?"

"Da, tovarisch." He looked up at his robotic minion, gaze directed somewhere else… somewhere long behind him. "To begin with, I'll take any chance I can get to give the Earth Alliance a black eye. More importantly… well, if _Minerva_ does run into that new Indian Ocean base, they'll be in trouble themselves. And given who's on that ship…"

She knew exactly what he was talking about. Most of the deaths he'd caused over the years didn't bother him at all; he saw them as the price of doing business… and some of them he was actually proud of. Even the killing of Shinn's family, while something he regretted, didn't cause him to lose _too_ much sleep, because he hadn't even known about it until years later. But the death of Erica Hawke… Cagalli knew he still felt terribly guilty about his annihilation of his own unit, and he went out of his way now to protect Erica's surviving sisters.

So instead of protesting, Cagalli merely gave him a quick kiss, and smiled. "Just be careful out there, Kevin. If you die on me now…"

Kevin pulled her close for an instant. "…I will never die," he said quietly. "Not as long… as I have something to come back to." He let her go, and stepped back. "Now… I'd better get going. I know _Minerva_ isn't _supposed_ to be getting into combat yet, but Artemis believes they _will_ be attacked in the Indian Ocean. That's my cue."

She nodded. "Okay, Kevin. I'll see you when you get back."

He threw a jaunty wave, crouched, and leapt straight up, caught hold of Nemesis' right knee, flung himself higher up, and took one more leap up to the cockpit. Admittedly, it would've been both faster and easier to use the zipline or the cockpit-level catwalk, but Kevin firmly believed in testing his own skills at every opportunity. He never knew when he might need them for real.

Settling into the form-fitting pilot's seat, he began system startup… and heard a distinctive click inside his skull. _"One week from today,"_ a female voice began without preamble, _"at the place of death in my homeland. Come alone."_ The voice cut off as abruptly as it had begun.

Part of Kevin's mind continued the startup of the antimatter reactor… but the rest was suddenly very busy with another matter. _That voice… so the time's come, has it? A day of reckoning… I wish she'd waited, but I suppose it's better to get it over with._ Nonetheless, his blood had chilled at the words the woman had spoken. Not much could faze him… but the encounter she suggested most certainly could.

He shook himself. There was no time to be worrying about that now. In a week, yes, he'd be risking his life… but he would be today, as well. _No battle is ever certain. Keep your mind on the present, or you'll lose everything._

Nemesis completed activation, and converted to mobile armor mode as it entered the starboard catapult. Unlike Freedom, it was capable of submersible launch, and that was what he intended to do, to reduce risk of detection. "Bridge, Kevin here," he called. "Nemesis is in position."

"_We copy, Kevin,"_ Mir replied. _"Good luck… and come back safe."_

"Always do. Angel of Death, launching."

* * *

Author's note: In the wake of the events in Orb, Cagalli and Kevin have reconciled; and three old friends have rejoined them, bringing with them a truce from an old enemy and news of an even greater threat. Meanwhile, Athrun joins the _Minerva_'s crew… as does the Hydra's teacher…

Yeah, I know this chapter's probably a little late. Well, no help for it; I upgraded my computer last week, and it derailed my schedule for a little while as I worked out all the bugs. Hopefully, the next chapter won't take quite so long. And yes, I realize this chapter wasn't exactly action-packed, and probably didn't even have any real surprises in it, but there was some necessary setup going on. Besides, I did at least introduce a couple of mysteries… Anyway, let me know how it was. –Solid Shark


	16. Chapter 16: War's Shadows

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

******Warning: This chapter may include spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk  
**

* * *

"So, this is the mobile suit you took from Prometheus?" the man in the office's shadows asked, peering intently at the holographic image."

"_Affirmative,"_ a mechanic said from the other end of the communications link; unlike the man he spoke to, the mechanic was physically present at the examination site. _"The prisoners we took from _Concepcion_ refuse to talk, but according to its own limited database, it's designated MBF-X15A/M Foxhound, and purportedly belongs to a special unit known only as 'FOX'."_

The shadowed man nodded. "Assessment, please."

"_At first glance, Sir, it appears to be a development of the original MBF-M1000 design."_ As the mechanic spoke, several portions of the hologram were highlighted, particularly the twin buster rifle held in one hand, the sleek wings on its back, and the distinctive head. _"However, upon closer inspection it becomes clear that this is a completely new frame, carrying over only a few cosmetic touches, the twin buster rifle, and the ZERO system. The rifle appears to be the same model observed on MBF-M1000B Nemesis, though slightly more streamlined… and there ends the design similarities."_

"So he's been innovating again… Based on Destroyer data?"

"_Unknown. As far as I'm aware, only Walker's own cortical implant contains complete Destroyer research data, and possibly not even that. It's clear, though, that he's been busy somehow. The antimatter reactor is fully functional; an impressive feat in itself, and suggests why Nemesis is so powerful. Also, it has a new, rather unique transforming system. We're still examining that, but it appears to be more complete than the mobile armor modes of either Sturm Falke variant. In any case, we estimate that it outperforms Nemesis in terms of mobility by a factor of at least three."_

The shadowed man's eyebrows went up. "Impressive… I assume that means that it can _only_ be controlled by a cybernetically-augmented pilot?"

"_Essentially. Any unaugmented man would be knocked unconscious, possibly killed, by the maneuvers Foxhound pulls on a routine basis. Besides, the only controls are neural interfaces; there's no sign of any manual controls at all."_

The man steepled his fingers. "Fortunate that we chose the pilot we did… Is his condition stable enough to control the Foxhound?"

"_As near as we can determine, yes. Certainly he can operate the systems we've discovered so far; most of it's fairly straightforward. Unfortunately,"_ the mechanic went on, with a grimace evident in his tone, _"there are at least two systems we can't access at all. They seem to be restricted by an unusual biometric lock, keyed to a genetic marker none of the copies appear to possess. Whether it's a modification Walker made to his own genome at some point, or something that simply failed to crossover in the copying process, is at this point unknown; the onboard computer won't even tell us what the marker _is."

"What systems?" the man said sharply. "Anything critical?"

"_Critical, no; useful, yes. Both the ZERO system and the new, Colloid-based propulsion system are DNA coded."_

"Then it's sufficient for our purposes. The ZERO system is something we needn't meddle with at all; and the new propulsion system can wait until we've either reverse-engineered it or finished development of our own version."

"_Understood."_ The mechanic paused. _"I presume you want us to field-test the unit as soon as possible?"_

"Yes. We need to establish the pilot's stability, for one thing; and also, Foxhound is our best chance of bringing _him_ down. If you're right about its capabilities, even Nemesis should fall. However…" The shadowed man paused in thought. "Alter its IFF code. Call it… Leviathan. If it's going to be hunting a monster, it should sound like it."

"_Understood,"_ the mechanic said again. _"I expect we'll have the unit ready for deployment by the end of the week… though I should caution you we won't be certain of its usefulness until we've seen it in actual combat. Even Walker never had the chance to field-test it."_

"That's good enough. Thank you. Goodbye."

The shadowed man leaned back in his chair, thinking. _So… we finally have the means to remove that particular mistake. He's of no more use to me, or anyone else… and his presence on the battlefield is too much of a danger._

_Kevin Walker must be eliminated.  
_

* * *

Aboard the _Spengler_-class carrier _John Paul Jones,_ Captain Neo Roanoke watched with interest as the _Minerva_ approached, accompanied by a _Vosgulov_-class submarine carrier _Nyiragongo. _"So," he mused.

"ZAFT's trump card has arrived… I wonder what kind of a fight they'll put up this time." He glanced over at the ship's radio operator. "Get me the base commander."

"Right away, Sir."

Within moments, the base commander's voice came over the radio link. _"Yes, Captain Roanoke? What do you need?"_

"All of your Windams," Neo told him bluntly. _"Minerva_ and a submarine carrier are approaching our position now, and we know from previous experience that _Minerva_ is a problematic target. Is that understood?"

"_You can't be serious!"_ the other man blurted. _"This base is still under construction! We don't dare leave ourselves defenseless like that, Captain, no matter what the reason!"_

The masked captain sighed. "Colonel, I didn't want to do this the hard way, but if you're going to be that stubborn, then I must inform you this is no longer a request. I'm _ordering_ you to release your Windams to our control. Is that clear?"

"_I-"_ The base commander started to protest again, but throttled back his anger. Arguing with the leader of Phantom Pain wasn't a good move, either for his career or for his survival. _"Understand, Captain Roanoke. They'll be on their way at once."_

Neo nodded. "Thank you, Colonel. And I'm not completely ignorant of your own defensive considerations; I'll leave you the Gaia to keep an eye on the place."

"_Much appreciated, Captain."_

The base commander's response might've been a touch sarcastic, but if so, Neo decided to ignore it.

* * *

Down in _John Paul Jones'_ mobile suit hangar, Stellar Lousier sighed in disappointment. "I don't want to be left out of the battle," she whispered in Gaia's cockpit, as much to herself as to anyone else. "I should be out there, with the rest…"

"Relax, Stellar," Sting Oakley advised from Chaos. "Why don't you just take the time to look at the ocean? There's a great view from here."

"Frankly," Neo put in, having joined them in his own, custom Windam, "I wish I could send you out there, Stellar, and I'm sorry. Unfortunately, I need to leave someone behind to keep Colonel Richards happy, and I'm afraid Gaia's the best choice for the duty."

Stellar sighed again. "I understand, Sir…"

"Cheer up; if a certain pain in the neck with a buster rifle turned up today, we may need you after all." His voice started out light, but turned grim as he finished, "After all, we all know how much trouble the Crimson Tiger can be… and how ruthless."

"He's got a point there," Auel Neider mused. "That guy's killed a lot of people over the years… most of them on our side."

"Exactly." Neo nodded toward the waiting hatches. "Now, let's get out there."

"Roger that. Sting, heading out." Chaos stepped quickly to the hatch, and leapt out into open air, massive verniers keeping him aloft despite gravity; he was swiftly followed by Auel's Abyss, which chose to drop right into the ocean.

"My turn," Neo murmured to himself, powering up his thrusters. "Hm… maybe that ZAKU Phantom pilot and I will be able to finish our match this time, without any interference… see who wins, fair and square."

With that thought in mind, his Jet Striker-equipped Windam took to the skies, in search of prey.

* * *

On _Minerva_'s Bridge, detection officer Bart Heim stiffened in his chair. "Incoming bandits, Captain!" he called. "Detecting…" He paled. "Detecting ZGMF-X24S Chaos… and thirty Windams. Repeat, Chaos and three-zero Windams."

Talia Gladys winced. "I see. Sound battlestations, and get the ship ready for combat." Without waiting for a reply, she brought up her own intercom. "Shinn, get to the Impulse, and launch immediately. Rey, Lunamaria, remain on standby for the time being."

"_I'm on it, Captain!"_ Shinn replied immediately.

"_Understood,"_ Rey said calmly. _"We'll be ready."_

"_I'm going out there as well,"_ Athrun interjected. _"Sounds like Shinn could use some flight-capable backup on this one."_

Talia nodded. "Understood, Athrun." She didn't even think of countermanding his decision; as they were both members of FAITH, she didn't really have that sort of authority over him. Besides, she agreed with the decision. "Please take command of our mobile suit operations; you're our most experience pilot, after all."

"_Will do, Captain."_ He paused. _"What's the situation out there?"_

"Not good," she said frankly. "One _Spengler_-class carrier, one ship-launched Windam, the Chaos… and _twenty-nine_ additional Windams, presumed to be from an as-yet unknown base on shore. I'm sorry, but it looks like you're going to have your work cut out for you this time."

Athrun grimaced. _"I'm afraid you're right about that… but I've faced worse odds in the past. We'll make do, Captain."  
_

* * *

Unknown to the soldiers on either side, another mobile suit streaked across the sky toward them, its obsidian form hidden behind the radiation-blocking hyper-jammers buried in its fuselage. A frightening sight all by itself… and one that would meet with mixed reactions from the crew and pilots of the _Minerva._

_Still,_ Kevin Walker thought, _I don't really care whether they like it or not. If there was even a shred of evidence linking them to that attack, I'd blast _Minerva_ to atoms in an instant… but as it is, they're nothing more than dupes, and I hate the Earth Forces more than I hate anyone on that ship._

_And besides… Erica's sisters are there._

The self-proclaimed "Angel of Death" was not often troubled by the bodies in his past… but he'd do whatever he could to atone for the deaths of his comrades in ABADDON. Right now, that was best accomplished by protecting the ship containing Lunamaria and Meyrin Hawke… and Alec "Basilisk" King.

_Another day, another battle,_ the super-soldier mused to himself, preparing to deactivate the hyper-jammers and bring up another of Nemesis' new systems. _Huh; maybe I really do define myself by fighting… prove my existence by taking the lives of my enemies. Still… as long as I'm on the battlefield, it can be no other way._

Kevin's only real complaint at the moment was his choice of steed. By this time, he'd intended to be flying Foxhound; settling for Nemesis made him more uneasy than he cared to admit, under the circumstances. Unlike Foxhound's carefully-tailored design, Nemesis' very structure was unstable…

He shook off such doubts, as he cruised toward the battle zone; there wasn't time for them, and even Murrue would admit that Nemesis was a sounder machine than GAT-X401 Punisher, the modified GINN he'd ridden to destruction almost three years earlier.

Kevin took note, as he approached, of the catapult operations _Minerva_ was conducting (too far still to be scene with his own sensors, orbital feeds from Artemis kept him informed with satellite imagery). The first unit out was the Impulse, connecting with its various components in a way Kevin still found less than smart… but the second was something he didn't recognize at all. _A red mobile suit?_ he wondered. _Transformable… with a fighter mode much like the Murasames. Hm… looks like ZAFT had something else up their sleeves. But I have to wonder…. Who's in the cockpit?_

With a mental shrug, he settled in to wait for the proper moment to make his presence known. No sense in going off unprepared… or in a position that might allow the hotheaded pilot of Impulse another chance at him.

_After all… beware the fury of a patient man…  
_

* * *

"Here they come," Neo warned his subordinate, watching the two units from _Minerva_ fly toward them.

"The Impulse… and something new. Keep your eyes open, Sting."

"I know," Chaos' pilot acknowledged. "I'm going after the newcomer," he added after a moment. "Let's see what he's made of."

The masked captain shrugged. "Suit yourself." He, for one, opted to engage the more familiar Impulse; taking that irritatingly-skilled pilot out of the equation would be helpful, to say the least. _Now, if only that Phantom pilot was out here… or Walker. No, on second thought, dealing with that menace on top of what we've already got wouldn't be fun._

One thing that was certain was that the Crimson Tiger's fondness for overpowered weapons would _not_ be a welcome addition to this battle.

On the other side, Shinn and Athrun streaked across the sky toward their enemies, tense and ready to open fire at any moment. "Shinn," the older pilot called, "go for the Windams; I'll deal with Chaos. Got it?"

"With pleasure," Shinn responded, and peeled away. _I'd like another crack at the stolen units,_ he thought to himself, _but that can wait. These jokers come first._

Raising Impulse's beam rifle, he poured more power into his verniers, rushing to meet them head on. Streaks of emerald energy scorched the sky as he came, but he ignored them completely; poorly aimed, the impetuous pilot considered them no threat.

_My fire, on the other hand…_

Sidestepping to the right to allow an emerald dart to streak past Impulse's head, Shinn's finger tightened on the trigger, waiting for a lock with his targeting computer. The first Windam filled his sights, growing larger with every passing moment… and red crosshairs focused on it at last.

Instantly, he squeezed the trigger.

The Windam was just firing a blast from its own rifle when Shinn's shot lanced into its cockpit, melting through armor and circuitry like a knife through butter, vaporizing the pilot, and smashing out through the verniers. Uncontrolled, its flight systems wrecked, the Earth Forces mobile suit tumbled out of powered flight, slammed into the ocean's surface, and blew itself apart in an explosion of flames and debris.

In the same moment it went down, Shinn had already shifted targets. His shield snapped up to spatter a bolt of coherent light from one Windam, and he immediately retaliated, letting fly with a pair of bolts in quick succession. One smashed the Windam's head off in a shower of sparks; the other ripped into its fuselage, just below the cockpit, and burrowed into the main battery.

The result was essentially an overcharge of the battery, and the Earth Forces pilot had time for only a brief cry of surprise before his mobile suit was suddenly flying in all directions at once… none of them in a controlled fashion.

Two more machines fell in a similar fashion, neither coming even close to hitting Impulse with return fire, and Shinn shook his head in disgust. _Whatever happened to the pilots who fought so hard in the last war?_ he thought, unimpressed. _At least the Earth Alliance mobile suit corps had _some_ skill back then! As it is… with four down that fast, they're not all they're cracked up to be, even in those new models._

And that was when another emerald dart streaked down from above, and nearly catapulted Shinn into another plane of existence.

He threw Impulse backwards just in time to avoid the burst, and raised his shield to ward off a second. _What is this?_ he wondered, staring up at the new enemy. It was just another Windam… but _this_ Windam was painted violet, with black trim. On top of that, it's pilot was clearly several cuts above the cannon fodder he'd fought so far.

In its cockpit, Neo smiled tightly. "Ready for a real challenge, kid?" he whispered to himself. "Let's finish what my pilots started, at Armory One…" Raising his rifle again, he dove out of the sky, ready to waste his young adversary…

* * *

With Kevin's Nemesis already in the air, and neither Freedom nor _Archangel_'s other machine, Cagalli's old Strike Rouge, intending to launch, it was with some surprise that Kojiro Murdoch heard the starboard catapult open.

The ship had surfaced for the time being, awaiting Kevin's return –Murrue felt he wouldn't really care to make his landing on a ship over a hundred meters beneath the ocean's surface- so it was a simple matter for the menacing black mobile suit to make its way aboard. That part was easily explained.

Murdoch was just wondering _why…_ a question made even more pertinent when both Murrue and Cagalli walked into the hangar to meet it.

"Somebody mind telling me what's going on?" the mechanic asked plaintively. "That looks like one of Snake's Prometheus suits, but what's it doing _here?"_

"That's the Morgan," Murrue answered obliquely, "Max's personal mobile suit. She arrived a few minutes ago, asking permission to land; she says she has urgent news, but she wouldn't say what over the radio."

"She's as paranoid as her father," Cagalli opined. "Not that I blame either of them, after everything Kevin went through."

The older woman looked at her in confusion. "Her _what?"_

"You'll see," Cagalli said simply. "It's… weird, I'll tell you that."

As they were speaking, Morgan's hatch opened… and the pilot descended to the deck with audible thump, instead of the soundless landing Murrue would've expected from a hologram. _Except,_ she realized, eyes widening, _that _isn't_ a hologram…_ "Max…? Is that… Then you completed the project… But that appearance…"

Max glanced at her with an amused smile. "Oh, this? Well, you knew I was tired of being just a computer program, and that the Prometheus wiz kids and I did some fancy nano and genetic engineering to create a body; I just never mentioned it involved blending Kevin's DNA with recovered samples of Rachel Carver's in what was essentially artificial conception."

Murdoch stiffened in surprise, and Murrue's eyes widened even further. "You mean," she whispered, "you've become…?"

"The daughter Kevin and Carver never had a chance to have," the former AI confirmed softly.

"That's… incredible," _Archangel_'s captain managed. "Kevin will be… stunned, to say the least. I'm sure he never imagined…"

"So am I; and I'm looking forward to springing it on him." Max's expression sobered. "But there's something more important I need to tell him. Where is he?"

"He left about an hour ago," Cagalli informed her. "He went off to help the _Minerva._ Why, what's wrong?"

"The _Minerva?"_ Max repeated sharply. "Oh, that's _not_ good."

Murrue looked at her in confusion. "Why not?"

The black-haired woman sighed. "Because now he won't have any warning at all before running into someone he's _not_ going to expect to see in ZAFT uniform… or be very happy with. Pray that he's in a tolerant mood when he finds out, Murrue, or there could be fireworks out there."

* * *

"Who _is_ this guy?" Shinn wondered aloud, dodging another beam from Neo's Windam and shattering a missile barrage with his CWIS. His own attempt at returning fire was contemptuously ignored, with the Windam slapping aside the beam with his shield and ducking into a patch of clouds. "Whoever he is, he's fast…"

"Not bad, kid," Neo granted, diving back out of the clouds, "but you're still too green." Putting aside his rifle, he snatched out a beam saber, bringing it down in a diving slash.

Impulse met the blow with its own saber, leaving the two machines hanging in the sky in a clash of crimson fire. _I'm not about to lose here!_ Shinn thought, and shoved hard against the Windam's saber, forcing it back. "That's not going to work," he snarled, slashing out with his own blade. "I won't let someone like _you_ take me down!"

Neo snorted, twitching to one side to allow the saber to flick past his head. "Definitely an anger-management problem," he murmured. "I might be able to take advantage of that…" He lashed out, gaining the satisfaction of caring a tiny slice off Impulse's left arm, before spinning around and gaining altitude again.

"You're not getting away!" Pouring more power into his verniers, Shinn gave chase, determined to take down his opponent. _He actually damaged Impulse… he'll pay for that._

"Ah, the impetuousness of youth," Neo murmured, shaking his head. "Well, we all take our chances…" He keyed his radio. "Windam pilots, this is Captain Roanoke. Concentrate fire on the Impulse."

"Roger that!"

The bursts of emerald energy coming from below and behind warned Shinn of his predicament, and he whirled in surprise. "Wha- More?"

More streaks of light came toward him, forcing him to abandon his pursuit of the command machine in favor of saving his own skin. Diverted from offensive action, Shinn had no choice but to bring up his shield and start evasive maneuvers, juking Impulse in all directions.

Below, Athrun saw his situation, and grimaced. "You're getting too far out," he chided. "Stick closer to the ship, or else-"

A barrage of missiles and beams from his three o'clock interrupted him, and he converted Savior into mobile armor mode in a gamble to evade the onslaught. "Going somewhere?" Sting mocked. "I don't think so!" His weapon pods were open, allowing him greater firepower, even if their remote capabilities were nonfunctional in atmosphere.

Athrun cursed now, irritated with his own complacency, and was about to turn and return fire when something odd caught his attention. Something in the corner of his eye… _Storm clouds?_ he thought, bemused. _But the weather isn't…_

Whether it made any sense or not, what appeared to be a thunderstorm was indeed forming in the airspace in and around the battlefield. Small, but distinctive… right down to the crack of thunder as a bolt of synthetic lightning lanced out and nearly pulverized the Chaos.

_Wait a second,_ Athrun thought in sudden comprehension. Synthetic_ lightning… that means…!_

He wasn't the only one to understand what was going on. Shinn, upon seeing the bolt of azure light, bared his teeth in a grimace. "Walker!" he snarled. _What is _that_ bastard-? Comes in under a smokescreen, and now he's going to play the hero again… one day, I _will_ kill him!_

Shinn had correctly identified the cloud effect, and within moments the smokescreen dissipated, revealing the obsidian frame of MBF-M1000B Nemesis. Twin buster rifle in one hand, a sheet of glowing energy protecting the left arm, and wings spread behind it, it had obviously come here looking for a fight.

"So that's… Nemesis…" Athrun whispered. "Built from the wreckage of Stormhawk… but what's Kevin doing here? Why help _Minerva_ when Cagalli isn't even anywhere near…?"

"Interesting party you have here," Kevin observed over the radio, "but I have to say the décor would be more attractive without the Earth Forces Windams." Nemesis' head turned, jade gaze looking straight at the Chaos. "Of course, that stolen machine is even uglier… Well, I couldn't help but notice nobody invited me to the party, so I decided I'd just, you know… crash it."

Shinn's eyes flamed. "This is none of your business, Walker. We don't need your help!"

"Too bad. I'm not much interested in what _you_ do or don't need, Asuka." Kevin smiled, with just a trace of mockery. "Fact is, I don't trust you to defend that ship; your temper is worse than a rhino with an ingrown hair. And since I happen to owe a debt to a couple of people on that ship, and just maybe because I'd like to see every single Earth Forces soldier drop dead, I thought I'd drop by."

"If _you_ don't want to drop dead," the younger pilot said dangerously, "you'll leave right now, before I…"

Nemesis rotated in the air to face Impulse, twin buster rifle held casually to the side. "You don't impress me, Asuka," Kevin said quietly. "Not your attitude, not your skills, and certainly not your mobile suit. If you made the foolish decision you're contemplating, you would be dead in an instant… for I am the Angel of Death."

The two mobile suits simply stared at each other, until someone else got the idea to intervene. "You really should listen to him," Neo remarked, slashing down out of the clouds again. "You've got more immediate problems, kid!"

Shinn cursed, bringing his blade back up to guard. "This is another reason I don't want you here, Walker," he snarled. "You always just confuse things!"

"I do tend to have that effect on people," Kevin said agreeably, and turned his attention to the other ZAFT mobile suit. "So, what's your story, pal?"

Athrun hesitated for a long moment, knowing the moment inevitable but reluctant to bring it about nonetheless. _He doesn't know… but the moment I speak, he will. And when he does… what happens then?_

The delay seemed like an eternity, but in reality it was only a few moments before Athrun spoke. "Kevin… I…"

Kevin froze. _It can't be!_ "…Athrun? What are _you_ doing here… in a ZAFT mobile suit?"

* * *

"Do you have any idea where those Windams came from?" Talia asked of _Nyiragongo_'s captain; for now, she ignored Nemesis' arrival, knowing that _that_ man could handle himself quite well on his own. "If we can find where they took of from…"

"_I'm afraid not,"_ the submarine captain said, shaking his head. _"The command unit and the Chaos obviously came from that carrier, but we're not reading any bases or other ships close enough to have launched the rest."_

"I see." She sighed. "I wish I could say it was unexpected, but if we can't pick up anything, I wouldn't expect you to, either. Well, keep looking; that should be our primary focus while Shinn and Athrun fight off the enemy mobile suits."

"_Understood, Captain Gladys. We'll-"_

"_Anomalous sonar contact, Captain!"_ _Nyiragongo_'s sonar operator interrupted. _"Detecting Abyss, directly ahead!"_

Talia went cold. _Another of the prototypes… I should've known that where there's one, there's more._

"Meyrin," she said aloud, "instruct Luna and Rey to launch immediately and engage in underwater combat with the Abyss."

"Yes, Captain!" Meyrin turned back to her own post, muttering orders into her headset. _Well,_ she thought inwardly, _at least Walker turned up. I just wish Luna would be a little more open-minded about him…_

"Captain," Talia said, returning her attention to _Nyiragongo,_ "I suggest you launch your GOOhNs at once; they're the only units we've got that are optimized for underwater combat."

"_Agreed. I'll send them out immediately."_

_Now,_ she thought, _the battle takes a new turn…  
_

* * *

"Athrun," Kevin said, his voice soft and dangerous, "just what do you think you're doing? Last I heard, you were going to the PLANTs to find out from Durandal just what was going on."

"I also said I couldn't just sit by while a war was going on," Athrun replied carefully. "Remember?"

"Yeah, I do… but you never said a word about returning to ZAFT." The jade eyes on Athrun's monitor were growing colder by the moment. "You'd better have a very good explanation for this, tovarisch, or else I'll…"

The blue-haired pilot swallowed. He remembered all too well their conflicts in the first war… and their meeting after the destruction of the Aegis, when Kevin had warned him that if Cagalli were ever in danger, he would not hesitate to kill _anyone…_ including Athrun.

"Look, Kevin," Athrun began, "this time is different. ZAFT isn't-"

Before he could finish the sentence, Nemesis snatched its left-hand beam saber out, energized the azure blade, and charged right at him. He felt an instant of hear, knowing his current unit was no match for the raw power of the Nemesis… until he realized he wasn't the target at all.

Instead, Kevin blazed right on past Savior, driving his blade of synthetic lightning forward with such ferocity that Sting had to jerk Chaos back very sharply indeed. "Bastard!" the Extended hissed.

"We'll save the argument for after the battle, Athrun," Kevin said, voice cold. "Right now, it looks like we've got bigger problems. You with me?"

The fact that he was offering to cooperate at all was a good sign, as far as Athrun was concerned. "I'm with you," he said firmly. "Just like old times."

The super-soldier smirked. "As long as it's not _too_ much like old times. If this turns out like the time we smuggled a ferret into the principal's office…"

"It was your idea," Athrun reminded him.

Kevin stuck out his tongue. "Don't remind me." Briefly saluting Savior with his saber, he turned back to the enemy. "Any idea just what the devil is happening around here? There's no way that one carrier launched all _this."_

"I was just about to ask the captain that myself." Athrun turned back to the battle, noted Luna and Rey launching into the water, and switched radio frequencies. "Captain Gladys, what's going on? Why did Luna and Rey launch?"

"_The Abyss is attacking underwater,"_ Talia replied. _"I just sent them off to take care of it. What about you? Any sign of the base that launched these Windams?"_

He shook his head, snap-rolling to let a shot from Chaos scorch past him. "Not yet. I don't see _anything_ that could've deployed this many; no ship, no land base, nothing."

"_Keep searching; the sooner we find that, the better."_

"Understood." Athrun glanced at Nemesis, which was currently engaged in a vicious saber duel with a Windam. "Kevin, have you had any luck?"

"Negative," Kevin responded, using Nemesis' superior strength to shove the Windam's arm away, before pressing his twin buster rifle right against its torso and pulling the trigger. "I have no information on anything that would explain _this…_ which is odd, because I thought I had complete satellite coverage of this hemisphere."

His friend nodded, unsurprised; and winced at what happened to the Windam Nemesis had targeted. "Buster-class" weapons were essentially high-energy plasma weapons. The azure color, so different from the usual visual effect of weapons like Freedom's Balaena cannons, was an indication of their raw power; with their fusion chambers built to tolerate a much greater energy density, even a "standard" shot was more powerful than any beam rifle, and the higher settings, though energy hogs, were truly a sight to behold.

So when a bolt powerful enough to raise the temperature of laminated armor to dangerous levels struck the armor of a simple Windam, the reaction was… energetic. Warped and blasted by the discharge, the Windam's fuselage simply vanished, while its limbs, also warped by heat, ripped off in all directions.

"Hm…" Kevin murmured. "Might want to narrow the focus next time…" Mentally adjusting his weapon's aperture, he spun around to face the Chaos again. "All right, you Earth Forces rats. Let's dance!"

* * *

Four emerald bolts flashed out in rapid succession, piercing the torsos of four different Windams, and they blew apart in a shower of debris, while their blue and white killer kept right on going, chasing the leader. _You're not getting away,_ Shinn thought, pumping out more emerald fire. _Not this time!_

Neo juked his command Windam around, allowing the beams to simply bracket him on their way by, but he wasn't as sanguine about the situation as he would've liked. "He's better than I expected," he muttered. "He's learned from Break The World… and it doesn't help that the Crimson Tiger had to show up. So… what do I do now?"

Actually, there _was_ one thing that had been added to his to-do list: decking Yuna Roma Seiran. _If it hadn't been for that idiot, the Tiger might not have come back. As it is, I'm not sure our new alliance with Orb is worth the cost of _him_ resurfacing…_

Neo was still pondering exactly how to deal with the current situation, dodging fire and occasionally sending some of his own back at Impulse as he did so, when something from below caught his eye, and he smiled. "Well, now, that could make things interesting…"

Shinn, for his part, was lining up on the command Windam again when three streaks of emerald fire, two of them clearly cannon fire, erupted from somewhere below him. "What the-?"

He cut off the exclamation, looked down, and bit off an incredulous curse. They were nearing land now… and a unit that had apparently been left behind for this very contingency had chosen to take part in the battle, now that they were in range.

Down below, the stolen Gaia was literally running on water, all the while firing up at the Impulse with its rifle.

_Blast! I'll have to let him go for now…_ Abandoning the chase, Shinn brought Impulse up in a loop, put away his rifle, and energized a beam saber, before launching into a powered dive toward the Gaia. _I'll have to deal with this first… finally._

In Gaia's cockpit, Stellar saw him come, smiled thinly to herself… and drew her own blade of frozen fire.

* * *

"Impressive battle going on up there," Natalya Ivanova Arkanian noted, standing on _Minerva_'s Bridge. "It looks as though they were waiting for us."

"Apparently so," Talia agreed sourly. "We've already lost _Nyiragongo_'s GOOhNs; now _all_ we have are those four, along with Captain Walker's assistance… though what _he's_ up to, I have no idea. It's not like him to suddenly appear and attack like this."

"Oh, yes, it is," Arkanian disputed. "For one thing, I expect he still feels a certain guilt for what happened five years ago; he'll go to great lengths to protect family members of his fallen teammates. Moreover, this _is_ the Earth Alliance we're fighting. Hydra will stop at nothing to see them punished for the years he spent on the run… and for the deaths of his parents."

The younger woman grimaced. "So we're dealing with someone who fights for revenge?"

"Only in his spare time. That man acknowledges the orders of only two people, to my knowledge, but he _will_ obey those orders, if given. More than that, he fights ruthlessly to protect those close to him. If Cagalli Yula Athha were ever injured, he'd stop at nothing to protect her… or avenge her, if necessary." Delta nodded at the Savior, as it flitted through their field of view. "Athrun Zala's presence may be fortuitous; I doubt Kevin's very happy with him at the moment, but if Savior comes under heavy attack, we may see some interesting attacks out there."

Talia looked at her sharply. "Define 'interesting'."

Arkanian shrugged. "Who knows? I'm not a mobile suit pilot. I would guess something on the order of the Apocalypse, though; we never did teach them to take their foes alive, save for interrogation."

_Minerva_'s captain shook her head. "The more I learn about you and your students," she said softly, "the more I come to realize just how frightening you people are. I sometimes think its fortunate your unit was never deployed before Walker destroyed it."

The ex-mercenary sighed. "The devil of it is, Captain… so do I. If we'd been dispatched under that madman Oracle, the results… would've been terrible…"

* * *

As Savior and Nemesis, both in mobile armor mode, circled through the air, each trying for a clear shot at the Chaos, Athrun's gaze was briefly drawn toward Impulse, which had flown very close to shore now. _What is he..? _His mouth tightened, seeing the machine knocked down by a leaping shoulder charge from Gaia. "Get out of there, Shinn!" he called, as Impulse fell into the water. "Pull back; can't you see it's a trap?"

Shinn's reply was quick, curt, and to the point. "Shut up!" he snarled back, and lunged out of the water, saber in hand, to lash out at Gaia in retaliation.

Even Kevin, maverick though he often was, stared in disbelief. "Did he just tell you to shut up?" he said incredulously. "From what I've seen, you're the mobile suit commander on that bucket of bolts… and he not only disobeyed a direct order but told you to _shut up?"_

"It looks that way," Athrun said tightly. "And he'll hear about it after the battle's over, believe me."

"He'd better. I've been on the battlefield most of my life since adolescence, and I've never seen that kind of insubordination; not even from Kira, when he was under Flay's influence." Kevin shook his head. "How on earth did he get through training with _that_ kind of attitude? I know ZAFT is more informal than most militaries, but no attitude like that should be allowed in a red uniform."

"You'll get no argument from me on that one," his friend assured him. "That attitude is going to get him killed if he's not careful."

"You can say that again." A longtime soldier, Kevin Walker might rarely accept someone's authority… but when he did, he obeyed his orders unless they were either pointlessly suicidal or downright wrong… and he'd never even _think_ of talking back to his commanding officer that way without a _very_ good reason. "…You want me to drag that idiot back here?"

Athrun thought about that for a few moments, sorely tempted, but eventually shook his head. "Thanks… but no. I don't think it would be a good idea for an Orb pilot –or Prometheus, whatever- to get involved in a ZAFT disciplinary issue."

Nemesis, having switched back to mobile suit mode, shrugged, as Kevin instinctively tried to do it with his own body. "It's 'FOX', actually; Prometheus is the fleet. Anyway, suit yourself." Momentarily giving up on attacking Chaos, he turned his attention to the _reason_ he was having problems with Chaos: several more Windams, which all insisted on shooting at him whenever he got a good firing solution. "I'll leave Chaos to you for now; I've got to go swat some noisy flies."

"Roger that." Peeling off, Athrun swept into a turn, bringing his dorsal-mounted beam cannons to bear. At the same moment, Chaos' weapon pods targeted him, and unleashed a barrage of missiles. Harmless individually, they could wear down even phase-shift in sufficient numbers…

At the last possible moment, Savior banked right, forcing the missiles to overshoot before they had time to match his turn. Seconds after they began to correct, they ran out of fuel, and dropped into the ocean below.

Athrun finally had a clear shot. _Now!_ he thought, and triggered his cannons… just as a salvo from behind slammed into his upper fuselage. Jostled by the impact, the streaks of emerald energy went off target, and Savior was forced into a rapid evasive, dodging through several emerald darts that also came from behind. "Who-?"

In the sky above and behind the ZAFT machine, Neo's command Windam hung. "You're not bringing one of my people down _that_ easily, Coordinator," the masked captain remarked. "No, not that easily at all…"

* * *

Crimson fire clashed, and Gaia was forced back a pace by Shinn's ferocious attack. Their battle had carried them onto the island shore by now, on the outskirts of a base. It appeared to be under construction… and was almost where the Windams had come from.

Now Impulse lashed out viciously with its saber, melting a gash into Gaia's right arm and taking a chunk of armor with it. The stolen prototype fell back several more meters, recovering, then thrust forward with its own blade.

Shinn jerked to the left, letting the blade of frozen fire burn only air, and retaliated with a fierce chopping blow that knocked Gaia's blade right out of its hand. "Give it up!" he snarled. "You've already lost!"

Stellar's eyes flashed. "I won't be defeated so easily." Not trying to retrieve the fallen blade –she knew Impulse would eviscerate her if she made that particular error- she instead pulled out her beam rifle again, and triggered a blast of emerald energy at pointblank range.

Shinn snapped up his shield at the same moment, spattering the bolt mere meters in front of his cockpit, and bared his teeth in a silent snarl. Letting go of his own saber, he smashed forward with his shield, slamming it into Gaia's right arm. With the arm having already been damaged by Impulse's saber, the shock short-circuited it, and the beam rifle dropped from suddenly powerless fingers… and Shinn put the rest of his plan into action.

Before Stellar could react to the loss of her weapon, Impulse reached out with its free hand and gripped Gaia's right shoulder, dropped its shield, and took hold of the machine's left leg. Then, with an effort perhaps best described as titanic, Shinn picked up Gaia and _threw_ it, sending it crashing into the base itself.

"Take _that,"_ he muttered to the enemy pilot, satisfied. "Now, what's going on _here…?"_

Finally taking stock of his situation –now that Gaia was effectively out of the fight- Shinn glanced around the enemy base. As he'd thought, it was still under construction… and antiaircraft weapons were firing on him, supported by battle tanks. Less than pinpricks to his phase-shift equipped machine, they were nonetheless irritating… but not as infuriating as another sight.

The workers who were building the base were running away from the battlezone, using a trench to stay below the line of fire… and judging from their appearance, they weren't volunteer workers, but rather slave labor.

That impression was supported by the fact that Earth Alliance soldiers were opening fire on the trench, using automatic rifles to gun down anyone who tried to flee… regardless of the fact that not one of the workers was armed.

Shinn's jaw tightened. Looking on as civilians –_slaves-_ were ruthlessly murdered, he was reminded of the day he'd watched his own family die, killed by an azure bolt from the sky. Just like these people, his family had been helpless, just trying to get away… but there was one difference between the two situations. That day, he'd been unable to change anything.

Now he had the power to make a difference.

_They're just trying to reach their families,_ he thought in growing fury. _They've been enslaved by the Earth Forces, and now all they want is their freedom, and they're just being cut down like animals!_

Reaching a decision, Shinn turned Impulse around, lowered its head… and opened up on the Earth Forces soldiers with his CIWS. At the same time, he pulled out his beam rifle, and turned it on the tanks and antiaircraft artillery, melting them away even as his point-defense tore ground soldiers apart.

Impulse strode through the base, a raging demon of destruction unleashed.

* * *

His surprise attack on the new ZAFT mobile suit hadn't worked as well as he'd planned, Neo reflected; the cursed machine was far too maneuverable, and the Nemesis was also causing problems… as evidenced by the fact that his Windams had been scorched to debris and melted parts with absurd ease.

_There's no point in continuing this battle,_ he thought. _We're down to just three effective machines, and I've no doubt Nemesis can blast me apart if he ever gets around to it. Time to retreat, and finish them off another day._

"All forces, fall back," Neo radioed. "With our Windams gone, and Gaia disabled, there's no point in continuing this engagement. Understood?"

"Breaking off now?" Auel said incredulously; unlike his airborne comrades, he'd been having little trouble with his own foes. Neither ZAKU variant was well-adapted to underwater combat, after all. "That's crazy! We can still take them!"

"You haven't exactly made any big kills yourself," Neo pointed out. "These pilots are a little better than we counted on, that's all. Now retreat, Auel."

"Not just yet. There's one big kill I _can_ get before we leave."

Beneath the waves, Abyss broke away from its game of cat and mouse with Luna and Rey, and powered through the water toward a new target. A bigger target… which would have a much harder time getting away than a pair of mobile suits.

The captain of the submarine carrier _Nyiragongo_ saw Abyss approaching, and turned to his link with the _Minerva._ "Captain Gladys, Abyss is approaching our position at high speed. We're can't-"

"Torpedoes in the water, Captain!" his sonar operator interrupted. "Direction zero-zero-zero; there's no time to-"

Auel smiled a shark's smile, and his torpedoes impacted on _Nyiragongo_'s bow.

The concussive force raced throughout the ship, opening hull beaches through the entire vessel, even as the initial explosion tore the submarine's bow open. Water rushed in, crushing or drowning anyone and everything in its path… and the trail of destruction reached _Nyiragongo_'s munitions' storage.

A gout of water reaching over ten meters high was the only sign on the surface of the massive explosion that tore _Nyiragongo_ to pieces… along with her entire crew.

* * *

Athrun, though grateful for the withdrawal of the remaining enemy forces, nonetheless cursed quietly, seeing _Nyiragongo_ blasted into a million pieces. _So close,_ he thought, _and then Abyss had to go and blow them up as some kind of parting shot…_

Kevin wasn't much happier; he wasn't exactly a big fan of ZAFT in general, but he disliked the majority of the Earth Forces rather more. "We'll get them another day, Athrun," he said quietly. "Even if I have to blast Abyss to atoms myself."

"You do know we'd prefer to recover it intact, don't you?" _Not that I expect you to really care what ZAFT prefers in this case…_

The super-soldier's words confirmed Athrun's expectations. "Tough. Which would you prefer? Intact Abyss and dead _Minerva_ crew, or destroyed Abyss, and living _Minerva_ crew?" He paused then, awaiting a reply… and caught sight of the violent activity on shore. "What the…? Athrun, is he supposed to be doing that?"

Athrun followed Nemesis' gaze, and his mouth tightened. Impulse was still within the grounds of the island base, CIWS firing at fleeing ground troops, beam rifle taking out fixed weapons with pinpoint accuracy. "No," he said with deceptive mildness, "he's not." Switching to his link with Impulse, he cleared his throat. "Shinn, get back here! That base is no threat anymore; break off your attack!"

To his anger –approaching fury, after the last contact he'd had with Impulse- Shinn ignored him completely, and moved to destroy a fence that stood between the slaves and their families outside the base. _Shinn, you need to learn what is and isn't acceptable behavior in a soldier…_

Athrun switched back to the contact with Nemesis. "Kevin," he said tightly, "I changed my mind. I could use some assistance for a moment. Just… try not to damage Impulse while you're at it."

"You got it, tovarisch." Power flow to Nemesis' verniers increased with a brief mental command, and Kevin took off at high speed for shore. "One insubordinate jackass of a pilot returned to ship, coming up."

Shinn was congratulating himself on a job well done, and preparing to finish off what was left of the base, when the obsidian mobile suit charged over to him, and landed only meters away. "What do you want, Walker?" he asked, mood instantly dampened. "I don't need or want your help here; I can handle things myself. Or didn't you notice the battle's over?"

Kevin snorted. "I think _you're_ the one who hasn't noticed the battle's over, kid. You just disobeyed a direct order from a superior officer to get your backside out of here… and for the record, your skills don't impress me in the slightest."

The hotheaded young pilot sneered. "And your point is?"

"That you're leaving." Unexpectedly, Nemesis' reached out, grabbed Impulse's shoulders, and unceremoniously threw the modular machine away, back toward _Minerva._ "Have a nice trip."

"Walker, you-!"

"Just return to the ship," Athrun interrupted sternly. "I shouldn't have had to call on outside assistance to settle a disciplinary matter, Shinn; don't make me do it again."

"Gr…" Grumbling, and more than a little irritated by both Nemesis' involvement and his own commander's insistence that he abandon what he _knew_ was the right thing to do, Shinn nonetheless obeyed orders this time, and flew back to the _Minerva_'s flight deck, followed quickly by Savior.

And behind them, an azure dawn awoke on the island as Kevin Walker, though mindful of the nearby civilians, finished what Shinn had started by burning the remains of the base into charred rubble.

* * *

Back aboard ship, after all the mobile suits had been squared away, Athrun confronted Shinn in the pilot's locker room… and, before saying a word, slapped the younger pilot in the face. "Just what did you think you were doing back there?" Athrun demanded angrily.

Shinn glared back, angered by the blow. "I did nothing wrong, 'Commander'. I saved those people, and reunited them with their families."

Athrun slapped him again, harder. "Whether it was right or wrong is beside the point," he snapped. "War's not about being a hero. You disobeyed two direct orders, displayed insubordination not even Yzak Joule ever got away with, and continued to engage soldiers who were no longer fighting."

"I made the right decision-" Shinn started to retort, but the older pilot cut him off.

"I told you, that doesn't matter. It's not your place to make those decisions, Shinn; you're a soldier, and a soldier is supposed to follow orders whether he agrees with them or not." Athrun looked him in the eye, gaze hard. "Don't ever ignore my orders like that again, Shinn. Is that clear?"

The crimson-eyed pilot wasn't fazed by the command. "Walker did the same thing I did, after you had him throw me back."

Athrun snorted. "There's a difference between you and Kevin, Shinn: you're a soldier of ZAFT, and subject to military discipline. He isn't. As the commanding officer of his own forces, he _does_ have the prerogative to make his own judgment calls, but you're just a pilot, so don't draw parallels between his actions and yours, understand?"

Shinn stared back for several moments, eyes flaming, before sullenly answering, "Understood." A pause. "Sir."

Still visibly angry, the hot-tempered pilot turned and strode past his commander, leaving the compartment with a brisk, angry stride.

It probably didn't help his mood any that Kevin entered just as he was leaving. Shinn gave the older pilot a glare on his way by… which Kevin merely accepted with a slight smile, completely unconcerned by the ZAFT redcoat's ire.

Athrun, for his part, was surprised to see Kevin aboard the _Minerva_ at all. "I thought you'd be heading right back to the _Archangel,"_ he remarked. "Frankly, I'm surprised you even got clearance to land in the first place."

Kevin shrugged. "Not so tough, under the circumstances; I _did_ just help you guys out, after all… and Talia and I go way back." His eyes hardened. "Now that I'm here, though, I want some answers, Athrun. What the devil are you doing back with ZAFT in the first place?"

His friend winced; this was a discussion he hadn't been looking forward to. "I know it's not the kind of decision you'd approve of, Kevin," he began carefully, "but even you have to admit your opinion is biased. Not without reason, to be sure, but biased nonetheless. I might point out, though, that the ZAFT you knew is long gone… ever since you incinerated my father."

The super-soldier's gaze didn't even flicker. "The ZAFT I knew is gone? Don't be so sure of that, tovarisch. Things have changed since you left for space, you know… things that I guess you aren't even aware of."

Athrun tilted his head. "I know Orb joined the Earth Alliance; I found that out the hard way, in fact. I also know that you're not on very good terms with them anymore… but what does that have to do with ZAFT? You yourself came out to help the _Minerva_ when she was ambushed outside Orb, and you came out again today to do the same thing."

"_Minerva_'s one of only three ships in all of ZAFT that I trust at all right now," Kevin said bluntly, "and the other two are both under the command of one of my own former shipmates: Yzak. The only reason I trust _Minerva_ is because I'm reasonably confident none of the conspirators are aboard."

"Conspirators…?" Athrun frowned, puzzled. "What conspirators? What are you talking about, Kevin?"

"I'm talking about the fact that my home was nearly blasted to smithereens a few days ago," the super-soldier said harshly. "Two dozen special forces troops equipped with a mixture of standard-issue ZAFT gear and leftover Next-Generation Special Forces equipment… and led by two members of the ABADDON unit."

Athrun stiffened. "The ABADDON unit? But that's impossible; the only ones left with any connection to ZAFT at all are Commander Arkanian and Alec King, right? So how could…?"

"Delta's rebuilt the ABADDON unit," Kevin answered. "She told me so herself… while also warning me that Case Ragnarok, a shoot on sight order applying to rogue Destroyers, was declared five years ago… and never rescinded." His voice hardened. "Two of those men attacked the mansion only days ago… and hurt Lacus."

His friend inhaled sharply. "Lacus was hurt? Is she…?"

"She'll recover; the wound was deep, but not fatal." Kevin grimaced. "Unfortunately, Hyperion and I were a tad more thorough in taking out Mongoose and Meerkat, so we had no prisoners to interrogate."

"Then you've got no proof they were ZAFT soldiers at all," Athrun pointed out. "By now, the Earth Forces must have a pretty good idea of how Destroyer technology works, so it's only a matter of time before _they_ start deploying them as well. It would also explain why you and Lacus were both targeted; they might've thought it was really Lacus making those broadcasts… and you've _always_ been a thorn in their side."

"Neat theory," the sandy-haired soldier admitted. "I suppose you could even argue that the ZAFT equipment was stolen; I imagine even the NGSF managed to leave some of their gear behind on some mission or other. Unfortunately, there's two problems with the idea: Mongoose and Meerkat referred to me quite specifically as 'the deserter'… and the commando team was supported by a half-dozen UMF/SSO-3 ASH amphibious mobile suits."

Athrun sighed. "I'll admit that does tend to prove they came from the PLANTS… but remember Break The World, Kevin. There _are_ still extremists committed to my father's ideals; and their use of Mark II High Maneuver GINNs indicates they've got a far amount of access within the military. Not exactly frontline units, but still newer models."

"Just one problem, Athrun: ASH units _are_ frontline models… or they will be, once they actually reach frontline units. Which, as of then, they hadn't." Kevin's jade eyes flashed. "Care to explain _that,_ tovarisch?"

"…I'm not sure there's any point in trying," Athrun said slowly. "It sounds to me like you've already made up your mind that Chairman Durandal's a murderous megalomaniac. Knowing you, I don't have much chance of changing your mind."

Kevin hesitated, then slowly shook his head. "…Not quite," he conceded. "Fact is, I'm not certain _who_ ordered it. I'm sure it was someone within ZAFT, and highly-placed at that, but there's at least one other candidate: Delta. She's ruthless enough to have ordered that, I'm sure… and quite willing to take the initiative without consulting the Chairman. It's possible she was behind it… and if so, she's mine."

Athrun thought about that. _It fits with what he's told me about ABADDON, _he thought unhappily. _And it makes more sense than the idea that Chairman Durandal would've done such a thing…_

"You could always just ask her," he said finally. "She's aboard _Minerva_ right now; and while you might not get the truth, I'm sure you'll at least know if she's lying."

Kevin shook his head again. "Not here. Delta and I will be meeting a few days from now, in Ukraine; I'll settle the matter then."

Athrun nodded. "All right. But if you're not intending to confront her here… then what _are_ you doing here?"

"I want the full story," the super-soldier said simply. "Of why you rejoined ZAFT… when you clearly _knew_ Lacus was being impersonated on Durandal's own orders."

Athrun sighed. "I'll admit I'm not entirely happy with that myself," he conceded. "I agree with _why_ he's doing it, but not what… Even so, even you'll admit, Kevin, that I couldn't base my decision solely on that one issue. Other than his… questionable means of keeping the PLANTs calm, I think he really is doing the right thing. ZAFT has taken no offensive action in this war other than what's necessary to defend the Homeland, and he's also been purging the corrupt elements within ZAFT itself and the government. On his watch, there won't be any repeats of the original ABADDON project."

"Leaving aside the possibility that he ordered the attack on my home," Kevin said unwillingly, "I'll concede the point. But why did _you_ join?"

The blue-haired pilot met his gaze steadily. "Because I couldn't just sit by and do nothing… and at the time, it looked like you were intending to do just that."

Kevin looked away. "There's a certain amount of truth in that," he said quietly. "I really _didn't_ intend to get involved in this one. But… Cagalli's abortive engagement changed that." He looked at Athrun again. "I know you're too stubborn to turn away from ZAFT until they finally _do_ tick you off badly enough, but if that happens… Well, Orb might not be a safe place right now, but you're welcome on the _Archangel_ or with Prometheus; or rather, 'Force Operation X', the special forces branch."

"I don't think it'll come to that… but thanks." Athrun raised an eyebrow. "So, what are you going to do now?"

"Go back to the _Archangel…_ and try to find out what happened to _Concepcion._ She was attacked not long ago, and captured with all hands… and a full load of cargo." Kevin eyes warmed, no longer chilly with anger, but rather concerned. "Be careful, tovarisch. _Concepcion_ was carrying MBF-X15A/M Foxhound, intended to be my personal mobile suit. It's a completely new design, and outclasses even Nemesis by a fair margin. My personal belief is that it was stolen by elements within ZAFT… but I can't discount the possibility that my father now has possession of it, and even has an augmented pilot to fly it. If that's the case, watch your back. I don't think even _I_ could defeat it, and I created the thing."

Athrun nodded. "I'll remember, Kevin… and I'll make some discrete inquiries. I think you're wrong about ZAFT being behind it all… but I owe you a complete answer."

"Much appreciated, tovarisch." Kevin turned to go, then paused. "Just be sure to tell that Lacus look-a-like one thing, next time you see her: if she steps out of line, she'll get a visit from me."

Then he was gone but nit before uttering a last declaration full of cold malice, '…or I could be really spiteful and I'll just hand her over to Leona.'… and Athrun Zala shivered. He was glad Kevin hadn't done anything drastic on learning he'd rejoined ZAFT… but he had no doubt that if Meer went too far then she'd be dead at either the hands of Kevin or Leona. But he had a distinct feeling that the ex-NGSF soldier would truly make Meer beg for death if she ever got her hands on her.

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

_Minerva_ has fought its first battle with Athrun Zala aboard; and meanwhile, Kevin Walker has discovered his friend has returned to ZAFT. The repercussions may be significant to more than just one ship.

Meanwhile, someone else has obtained Kevin's next-generation mobile suit… and will soon be testing it against an unsuspecting enemy…

I realize this chapter is _extremely _late, and I apologize for that; Christmas and wrapping up the first chapter of Cry of the Falcon slowed things down some. Next chapter should be ready rather faster.

As for this one, I'm honestly not sure about it. I'm a little ambiguous about how it came out; but I'll let you people decide. In any case, I don't think that'll be a problem with the next chapter. Plenty of interesting things going on then… -Solid Shark


	17. Chapter 17: Battle of Titans

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

******Warning: This chapter may include spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk  
**

* * *

The Eurasian Federation. Once a major partner in the Earth Alliance, its military power had been virtually shattered by the destruction of the Joint Supreme Headquarters-Alaska in May of C.E. 71; its territory has also been ravaged during the chaos of Break The World.

Under the circumstances, it was only natural that most of its remaining military strength had been concentrated at a handful of bases, strengthening that which they had left, and protecting their homeland. Several of their bases were now considered impregnable, thanks to those defenses; nonetheless, the men and women who guarded them remained alert for any sign of ZAFT attack.

Therefore, Colonel Ivan Sergeyevich Borodin was relaxed yet cautiously alert in the command center of Peter the Great Base, just outside Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine. He idly sipped a cup of coffee as he watched his subordinates go about their daily business. _At least we're reasonably far from the frontlines,_ he thought to himself. _Unless ZAFT decides to waste on orbital drop on us, it'll take a lot of work for them to get this far. Besides, our isolation means they've no real _reason_ to come after us… which is just as well._

Though he would never have admitted it to anyone else, Borodin was, like many of his countrymen, becoming increasingly disillusioned with Eurasia's participation in the Earth Alliance. They'd borne the brunt of the losses at JOSH-A, and then suffered terrible damage during Break The World; in his opinion, and that of many others, the War was no longer worth the cost. Let the Atlantic Federation play at genocide if they pleased, but leave Eurasia to recover from its wounds. That was the idea that was gaining popularity throughout the nation.

Nevertheless, Eurasia _was_ still involved, so Borodin would follow orders… grateful that those orders would almost certainly never involve his base in the War itself.

With that attitude in mind, it came as something of a shock when his thermal detection officer –the base did _have_ a radar operator, but his instrument was useless at long range, thanks to the N-jammers- stiffened in his chair. "Incoming heat signature, Colonel!" he called. "Single point source, altitude two thousand meters and dropping. Distance ten kilometers, closing at approximately Mach one point five."

Borodin sat upright, tossing his coffee cup aside. "Identification?"

"Not in our catalogue, Sir," his Intelligence officer reported, quickly checking over the thermal data. "Computer currently identifies it as a mobile armor, but that ID is tentative-"

"Craft incoming!" the infrared operator called.

It was perhaps the most unnecessary report Colonel Borodin had ever received. Before his subordinate had finished speaking, the shockwave from the unidentified craft's passage blasted out the command center's windows… and then it came around for another pass, much slower.

This time, it came to a virtual stop over the base, as though examining it. In turn, Borodin examined it, and observed what appeared to be an oversized fighter craft of some sort. Overall night black, with crimson highlights, it possessed forward-swept wings, a pair of powerful thrusters at the tail, and a double-barreled energy weapon of some sort, hanging like a gunpod in a centerline position on the craft's underside. It had no visible canopy… which wasn't surprising, since Borodin estimated that it was a full seventeen to twenty meters from nose to tail.

"What _is_ that thing?" his Intelligence officer wondered aloud. "I've never seen anything like-"

"Silence!" Borodin snapped. "It doesn't matter what it is. Major Chernitskaya, launch your mobile suit team immediately; Captain Nevsky, begin antiaircraft fire. I want that brought down before it can begin its attack!"

"At once, Tovarisch Colonel!" Russia and Ukraine might've long been democratic, but some habits held on even into the Cosmic Era.

As all this was going on, the mysterious craft simply hung there, held aloft by vertical thrusters, while it turned about, scanning the base. That was all it did… until Major Vladimir Iosefovich Chernitskaya's contingent of Dagger Ls and 105 Daggers began to move out.

* * *

The moment the first Eurasian mobile suit came into view, the black craft spun on its axis with remarkable speed, fed power into its primary weapon… and sent an azure bolt straight into it, before powering up its main thrusters and blazing past the other defenders.

By the time the black craft had exited the confines of the base, its first target, a Dagger L, had essentially evaporated, its armor melted and blasted by forces it had never been intended to resist. The others, including Chernitskaya –who was then feeling grateful he'd chosen to put someone else on point- turned to track the enemy… just as it came around for another pass.

Blazing through at an appreciable fraction of the speed of sound, it fired another azure blast into a 105 Dagger, detonating it in a shower of sparks, and then went to rapid fire, blasting several buildings to debris and setting off several fires.

_By all that may or may not be holy,_ Chernitskaya thought, feeling a terror he'd never before experienced on the battlefield. _What the devil _is_ that thing? Who sent it?_ "All forces, engage!" he barked, forcing a calm he didn't feel into his voice.

His shaken comrades, galvanized into action by his sharp command, opened fire on the black craft, as did the base's fixed antiair and anti-mobile suit defenses. Their shots went wide, though, as their targeting computers found themselves unable to keep up with the black craft's blazing speed.

In the machine's cockpit, the pilot was just beginning to order his craft into a climb when a voice filled his helmet speakers. _"Good enough,"_ it said. _"The mobile armor configuration's capabilities are confirmed. Convert to walker mode."_

"…Understood," the pilot rasped, voice weak but understandable, and sent another mental command through his machine's systems, even as he reduced thrust.

Chernitskaya stared in incomprehension. The black craft had simply… _changed,_ and not in the typical way of a mobile suit returning to its primary form. Leaving aside the fact that its mobile armor mode was more complete than anything he'd ever heard of, with the possible exception of Orb's Murasames, he'd never seen one like _this._ Its forward fuselage remained in a fighter-like configuration… but part of the rear fuselage dropped away, forming into reverse-jointed legs, even as the thrusters moved forward to just behind the wings, and a pair of arms disconnect from the forward fuselage, gripping the terrible energy weapon it had used before in one hand.

_This is not normal,_ his mind insisted, watching the bizarre fighter-walker begin to stalk forward, moving like some deadly bird of prey. _That thing is…_

"Bozhe moi, Major!" his second in command gasped. "That unearthly thing has a buster rifle!"

Chernitskaya took a closer look at the "gunpod" in the black machine's right hand, and he went pale. As far as he knew, no Eurasian force had ever directly confronted a buster-equipped mobile suit, but he, like most Earth Alliance officers, had scene battle records of buster-class weaponry in use. Firing azure bolts of plasma, they were more powerful than standard beam rifles even in their standard modes. When used at higher power levels…

"Bring it down!" he snapped. "Don't let it come any closer!" _Walker,_ he thought, as he and his men opened fire with beam rifles. _Only the Crimson Tiger ever used buster-class weapons. That vnyebrachnyi… what is he doing _here?

To Chernitskaya's dismayed surprise, none of the bolts reached the terrible machine; instead, it simply raised its left arm, and took the bolts on a glowing shield, before returning fire with low-powered blasts of azure energy.

Another 105 Dagger, equipped with a Launcher Striker pack, attempted to damage it, firing an Agni hyper-impulse cannon, but the black machine countered even before the bolt of red-orange fire came out. Its own weapon fired, with lightning meeting fire, and the two beams simply canceled each other out.

"_Continue fire with present power settings,"_ the voice told the machine's pilot. _"Any use of Level Two or Three fire would doubtless attract Walker's attention."_

"…Understood… Engaging with minimal weapon power…"

The black machine continued to fire, paying little heed to the insects which attempted to harm it. Apart from using its shield to interdict defensive fire, and occasionally triggering fuselage-mounted machine cannons to distract them, it ignored the defenders. Stalking forward at a slow, deliberately menacing pace, it fired bolt after bold of synthetic lightning into the base, shredding fixed defenses like paper, turning buildings into kindling.

Another bolt streaked past the defending mobile suits, setting their hangar ablaze. _"What are you doing, Major?"_ Colonel Borodin demanded, barely suppressed panic in his voice. _"Stop that thing at once!"_

"We're trying, Colonel," Chernitskaya shot back, gritting his teeth. "All right, people. Long-range bombardment has failed; switch to close-combat. It doesn't seem to possess melee weapons."

"Understood, Major!"

Chernitskaya's exec was the first to make the attempt, dropping his Dagger L's beam rifle and snatching out a saber. Bringing the golden blade to life, he leapt forward with a snarl, while the enemy's rifle was aimed elsewhere.

"_Switch to mobile suit mode,"_ the voice commanded. _"Test close-combat capability."_

"…Understood… commencing melee engagement…"

Chernitskaya's eyes widened. His exec touched down again, charged forward, and swung his beam saber in what would surely be a bisecting cut… just as the black machine's knees came forward, the forward fuselage folded down, and the wings flipped to sweep downwards, while the twin buster rifle was shifted to the left hand.

And a blade of synthetic lightning sprouted from its right wrist.

The black mobile suit –for mobile suit it clearly was, however bizarre its transformation abilities- blocked the Dagger L's strike with absurd ease, drew back from the brief clash, and delivered a vicious backhand slash.

Captain Pavel Leonovitch Alexsov had time for one, agonizingly brief scream as his Dagger tore in half… and died, as it exploded in a shower of fire and debris.

_That's not possible,_ Chernitskaya thought, the back of his mind starting to gibber. _That… that's not human. That's a monster…_

"_Destroy the remaining defenders,"_ the voice directed, _"and raze the base to the ground. Leave no survivors."_

"…Understood," the pilot rasped. "…Commencing… final attack maneuvers…"

"Here it comes!" Chernitskaya warned his people. "Be ready for-"

Before he could finish the sentence, the black mobile suit's powerful main thrusters fired, and it skated across the ground toward them at incredible speed. It had dropped the buster rifle, leaving both hands free… and now bright azure blades sprouted from _both_ wrists.

Of the remaining nine Daggers, a young second lieutenant was the first to fall; before he could even bring up his saber, the nightmarish mobile suit slashed him in half from head to pelvis, leaving the two halves to topple, trailing sparks, before exploding.

Another swiftly followed, this time shot right through the cockpit with what looked like a Colt Single Action Army built to mobile suit scale… and firing azure beams instead of bullets. Mostly intact, the Dagger had only melted and burnt debris for a cockpit, and toppled over, ignored by the terrifying stranger.

The black machine holstered the beam revolver, spun around, and rammed the newly-reactivated right-hand blade into a third Dagger's upper torso. This time, the pilot survived the initial strike, but the propellant tanks for his thrusters were ruptured by the thrust, and ignited a fire… which spread to his energy battery.

The massive energy release ripped the Dagger apart from the inside, showering the interloper with hydraulic fluid… which just made it even more menacing, with the blood-fluid dripping down its black armor.

It was like a nightmare, Chernitskaya would reflect months later. No matter what he and his people fired at the strange machine, it was always either somewhere else or interposing that tough beam shield; and when two more of his mean attempted melee combat, it blocked on in a clash of blade on shield, slashed an azure blade through the other, and spun in a circle to finish off the first.

In a whirlwind of destruction, topped off by the use of the machine's machine cannons –mounted retractably in the shoulders in mobile suit mode- to tear apart the Eurasian major's last subordinate, the black machine destroyed everything around it… and turned at last to the commander of the insects attempting to sting it.

The machine then made its own, and only, transmission of the battle. "This is… but a taste… of my power…" the enemy pilot rasped. "…Today, you feel the… wrath of Leviathan. Remember that name… it will haunt you forever…"

It raised its arms, crossing its blades in front of its face… and slashed, tearing into the Dagger L's torso just above and just below the cockpit, severing its head and legs, before lashing out one more time to remove its arms.

Something in his cockpit exploded, and Major Vladimir Iosefovich Chernitskaya was blasted into unconsciousness.

* * *

Standing on a hillside two kilometers from the Eurasian base, a brown-haired man with amethyst eyes watched the battle… no, the _massacre_ that was unfolding at the installation. Peering through a pair of powerful electronic binoculars, he shook his head in disgust. "Someone sure felt like massacring Earth Forces troops today, Sandy. I wonder why?"

Sandra Lightman, the man's sapphire-haired second in command, shrugged. "I don't know, Paul. I think I can take a guess about where that mobile suit originally came from, though."

"_That_ is fairly obvious," Paul Steiger grunted. "It's too much like Onishi's original design, at least cosmetically, to be anything else. This is definitely one of Walker's Prometheus designs… but somehow I don't think it's him flying it."

"Not quite his style, no," Lightman agreed. "So… Onishi, you think?"

"He may be the one calling the shots," Steiger agreed. "It's not him in the cockpit, I'm sure; there's a better than even chance that his DNA isn't compatible with it, and I this isn't _his_ flying style, either… but he could well be the one behind it. This may be what _Concepcion_ was carrying when she was captured."

"Of course," Lightman said thoughtfully, "those _were_ GOUFs that attacked _Concepcion,_ not the ZAKUs Onishi usually relies on."

Steiger shrugged. "So? He's crafty enough to have stolen a few of them by now, too; we learned five years ago that he's smart _and_ cunning."

His exec grimaced. "Yeah. I really thought we had him when we gutted _Amaterasu."_

"So did I; and we _would've_ gotten him there if we'd anticipated his use of a second M1000 prototype." Steiger shook his head. "Who would've thought the bastard built _two_ of the things…?"

"The second was probably meant for Carnehan," Lightman mused. "I doubt he intended to leave him in the PLANTs forever."

"I'm sure he didn't; Carnehan might've been the older brother, the 'prototype', but he would nonetheless have been useful to Onishi. If he wasn't, he would've abandoned him when Blue Cosmos attacked GARM, nineteen years ago, instead of sending him into hiding."

"But why the PLANTs, of all places?" she wondered. "Why hide Carnehan's existence in the first place? He raised Walker as his own son, and got away with it; nobody even suspected the kid was more closely related to the Clynes until after the Battle of Mendel. For that matter, most people don't realize it _now._ So… why didn't he just raise them as twins?"

"Given that Carnehan's own genetic enhancements were beyond a normal Coordinator," Steiger pointed out, "even if not to the same extent as Walker's, it might've raised suspicions. _One_ prodigy could be explained, given that Onishi, however twisted, is clearly a brilliant man. But two? Just not happening, Sandy."

"Point," Lightman conceded. "But back to the matter at hand… do we warn Walker that his creation is on the loose?"

Steiger shook his head. "Negative. Frankly, I'd prefer not to reveal our existence to Walker for some time yet; we don't know how much information Onishi might be able to divine from Prometheus or FOX. It's a long shot," he admitted, "given Walker's stringent security, but it's possible… especially with all the copies of him around."

"That's putting him at risk," Lightman warned. "If he doesn't know for sure that Foxhound's coming for him, or that it performs this well, it could get him killed. And we need him, Paul; nothing we have has a realistic chance of bringing down Onishi's Stormhawk, especially if he's tinkered with it as much as we think he has."

Steiger sighed. "I know. I know it's a risk, Sandy, but we can't afford to let Onishi know we're still after him. Not yet."

His exec nodded unwillingly. "…I guess you've got a point there, Paul. But in that case… do we do anything about this situation at all?"

He nodded. "Yes. As soon as Foxhound leaves the area, we go in and pick up any survivors. I'm not leaving anyone to die… and we could use close-up observations about that thing. If it's under Onishi's control, instead of ZAFT, it could be coming after _us_ one of these days."

Lightman nodded again. "Got it, Paul." Then, glancing back at the Eurasian base, she winced. "I don't think we'll need to wait long," she observed quietly. "Judging from all that smoke and fire, Foxhound won't have any reason to be here much longer."

* * *

Colonel Ivan Sergeyevich Borodin watched in horror as the black mobile suit known as Leviathan stalked through his base, jade eyes a terrible contrast with the black armor. It had retrieved its twin buster rifle, and now, with no defenders remaining, fired precisely-aimed shots throughout the compound, blasting buildings to rubble and setting fire to what was left.

"It's a demon," a member of his command staff whispered in terror. "Ivan the Terrible, revived as a monster of steel…"

Borodin didn't even bother to reprimand the man; even had his own terror permitted it, a corner of his mind already recognized he was going to die. Leviathan had spared his mobile suit commander, but it clearly had no intention of sparing _him._

The monstrous weapon strode steadily, almost calmly, up to the command center, and stopped, its eyes gazing directly through the shattered windows, as though inspecting its prey. _By all that is holy,_ Borodin's mind whispered, gazing back at the graceful weapon, _at least it is a beautiful Death. Farewell…_

Leviathan's rifle glowed, and the last thing Ivan Sergeyevich Borodin ever saw was the burst of azure light, as it engulfed him and his entire staff.

"…Mission… complete…" Leviathan's pilot rasped. "…Requesting… new instructions…"

"_One moment,"_ the voice informed him. _"Status of the pilot?"_

"_Despite having to rebuild just about his entire scorched epidermis,"_ another voice said, _"he's in remarkable health… for a corpse. It'll still take time to fully regenerate his body, and even longer before the personality fragments reestablish themselves enough for him to be more than a killing machine."_ The voice whistled. _"It's impressive, I have to admit; I had no idea even a Destroyer could be reanimated this way. It's… almost creepy, really. Fascinating, but in its own way disturbing."_

"_Save it, Doctor,"_ the first voice advised. _"Just give me the facts. Will his body recover enough for Leviathan to be used at full capacity?"_

"_Oh, there's no doubt of that; tissue repairs are almost complete, and the personality fragments are reassembling nicely. When the time comes, he'll be fit to take on Walker."_

"_Excellent. All right, Leviathan,"_ the original voice said, returning his attention to the pilot himself, _"convert to mobile suit mode, and return to base."_

"…Understood…"

Leviathan, formerly known as MBF-X15A/M Foxhound, smoothly doubled over, retracted its limbs, and headed for the sky, its test completed… and its first true mission still ahead of it.

* * *

MBF-M1000B Nemesis set down on _Archangel_'s deck, disengaged its antimatter reactor, and seemed almost to sigh as all power left it.

Then its hatch opened, and Kevin Walker dropped lightly to the deck, ignoring a fall that would've badly injured or even killed a normal man. "Well," he observed to the girl waiting for him, "that wasn't so tough. The Earth Forces still don't quite know what to make of _Minerva,_ I guess."

"Or you," Cagalli opined, practically throwing herself at the super-soldier. "I'm glad you're back."

"Me, too," he chuckled, returning the embrace. "So, how are things here? Anything happen while I was gone, or are we still just making like fish and swimming for Scandinavia?"

She stepped back, and shrugged. "Nothing earth-shattering, really; but Max turned up not long after you left." She nodded at the Morgan, standing motionless next to Freedom and Strike Rouge. "She said something about hoping you were in a tolerant mood when you reached _Minerva._ Why would she…?"

Kevin's expression darkened. "That's something we need to talk to Kira about, too," he said quietly. "There's been a new development."

"What is it, Kevin?" Kira asked, walking into the hangar; he'd sensed his friend's disquiet, and come to see what was going on.

"Athrun was there," the super-soldier said simply. "Flying the final Second-Stage mobile suit, the Savior. Apparently… he's rejoined ZAFT."

Cagalli inhaled sharply. "He has? But… but why? What possible reason… and after everything that's happened in the last few weeks. Why would he do that?"

"Did you tell him about what happened at the mansion?" Kira asked, his own expression grim. "About what happened to Lacus?"

"I did," Kevin confirmed. "I also told him about _Concepcion_'s capture and the theft of Foxhound. However, he doesn't seem to believe that ZAFT could've been behind it. He has a point about Foxhound," he conceded, "in that my father could've been behind that one; and he's also of the opinion that it was Arkanian who ordered the attack… assuming it was ZAFT at all, which he's not convinced of."

"But those were ZAFT mobile suits that attacked you!" Cagalli protested. "You said they're not even in frontline service yet…"

He shrugged. "I pointed that out, too, but I don't think he's really thinking it through. He's convinced Durandal is indeed a reformer… and," he added unwillingly, "I can see his point there. I'd like to think that myself, and aside from the mansion attack and _Concepcion_'s loss, I don't even have any evidence to the contrary. Everything we _know_ he's done is true to his official platform, so even I have to admit those two actions don't fit his pattern. Nonetheless…"

"You don't trust him," Kira finished. "But Athrun wasn't there, so maybe he doesn't understand it the way we do… But why did he rejoin in the first place?"

Kevin shrugged again. "He said that he couldn't just sit out the war, that he felt he had to do _something_ to make a difference."

"He could've joined the _Archangel,_ or your Prometheus people," Cagalli objected. "I would've thought he'd prefer that."

"Except," her boyfriend said dryly, "for the fact that he had no idea _Archangel_ even still existed at that point, and my own forces were showing no signs of intervening in the conflict. No, _that_ part I understand, and I can even understand his reasoning as far as that Lacus impersonator goes. He doesn't like it, but he also can't afford to base his decision on one issue, however distasteful it is to him personally."

Kira looked at him shrewdly. "And what did you tell him about _your_ view of the imposter?"

"That if she steps out of line," Kevin said evenly, "she'll be getting a visit from me… or Leona. A visit she will neither enjoy nor survive; the way Durandal is manipulating public opinion through her is dangerous, Kira. She's helping keep the PLANTs calm, sure… but if she can keep them calm, she can just as easily convince them to support anything _else_ Durandal wants… like a major offensive of the sort Patrick Zala was planning before I incinerated him."

"Be careful, Kevin," Kira warned. "I look the other way when you talk about killing people like your father, because I know sometimes you have to do things like that if you want them brought to justice, and because I know it's the way you've had to live your life… but if you kill someone like her without a very good reason…"

(_You should know me better than that, Kira,_) Kevin said sharply over their link. (_I'm a soldier, maybe even a vigilante… but I am _not_ a murderer. Not without a devil of a good reason. I'm not going to walk up and shoot her in cold blood for what she's doing _now;_ I'll only do it if things get out of hand. But if they do, I won't hesitate, and don't you _dare_ get in my way. You have your way, and I have mine, and the plain fact is that sometimes words won't get the job done. For now, I'll let you and Lacus do things your way, but if it comes down to it, remember that there's a reason _I'm_ the weapon._)

Jade eyes stared into amethyst… and it was amethyst that eventually looked away. "Sorry," Kira said quietly. "You're right, I _do_ know better than that." He met his friend's eyes again. "And when the time comes to face your father… I won't get in your way." His own eyes hardened for a moment. "And if something like the attack on the mansion happens again, I'll be right by your side."

Kevin smiled. "Spasiba, tovarisch."

Cagalli shook her head fondly. "You guys…" The two of them had been through variations of that discussion more than once over the years; though Kevin's statement had been inaudible to her, she'd heard this enough times before to fill in the blanks.

"Looks like I missed something," a familiar voice commented. "Might've been just as well, from the emotions I was sensing a minute ago."

Kevin glanced up. "Max? I'd heard you were… Wha-?" He stared at the ex-AI, eyes wide. "Bozhe moi," he whispered. "It can't be…"

His cybernetic henchwoman had _walked_ into the hangar, footsteps of a physical body clearly audible… and he knew that face. Or, more precisely, he knew where the basis of that face came from. _That hair,_ he thought, stunned, _those eyes… glowing with an inner light, with slit pupils, but _her_ crimson color…_

Max nodded solemnly. "That's right… Dad. This body was created through genetic and nano-engineering, at Artemis… by combining your genetic code with samples from blood found in your old escape pod. Rachel Carver's blood. The effect was essentially an artificial version of normal conception… which makes me the daughter you and Medusa never had the chance to have."

Kevin Walker was known for being an extremely dangerous individual; the fear of battle was literally almost unknown to him, with only one opponent in the entire world truly frightening him. It was almost axiomatic that it would take an event of cataclysmic proportions to truly rattle him… so anyone knowing the legend of the Crimson Tiger would've been extremely surprised by what happened next.

His face paled, his eyes rolled up in his head, and he fainted dead away.

* * *

"I knew Kevin would be surprised to see her," Murrue remarked, sitting behind her desk in her old office, "but I didn't expect _that_ kind of reaction. The last time I remember him looking anything like that was just after returning from the GARM facility, two years ago…"

"I didn't expect it, either," Cagalli admitted. "…I probably should've, though." She leaned against a bulkhead, holding a mug of coffee in one hand. "Even now… he still hasn't completely moved on. That time, six years ago… it's still fresh in his memory."

The older woman nodded slowly. "And seeing someone who looked so much like Carver, fully flesh and blood, shocked him in a way almost nothing else could…"

"Yeah. But… there's more to it than that." Cagalli glanced over at _Archangel_'s captain. "Haven't you ever wondered why Kevin and I have never made any plans about the dynasty? I mean, whether we like it or not, it's something we're going to have to think about when we finally marry."

"The thought… _has_ crossed my mind from time to time," Murrue admitted. "I suppose I just figured it was something you were keeping to yourselves, or maybe that you'd agreed not to talk about it until the whole Seiran affair was resolved."

The blonde princess slowly shook her head. "No. The fact is… we _have_ talked about it, a couple times. Because we know it's something we need to think about. But… Kevin's always been more than a little ambivalent about the idea of having children at all."

Murrue's eyebrows went up. "I never would've guessed. He does so well with Reverend Malchio's orphans, after all, so I'd think he'd make a wonderful father."

"I think so too; and I think even Kevin realizes that." Cagalli sighed. "The problem is his genetic code. His genetic modifications, I mean; the twisted DNA his father engineered him with." She frowned, pensive.

"You know, of course, about his… mental problems, back during the War."

Murrue nodded. "Well, of course. A result of the mental and emotional trauma –not to mention physical torture- he suffered within months of his mother dying, right?"

"Not… exactly," Cagalli said quietly. "It actually goes back much farther… to before he was born." She took a sip of coffee, growing more pensive by the moment. "It's… the price of physical prodigy. Kevin's body is as physically powerful, agile, and durable as GARM's scientists could make it, even more than Kira's. But the tradeoff… Look. Kevin has an IQ of two hundred and twenty, slightly higher with his cortical implant active; that puts him well into genius level. But that genius is _highly_ unstable at times, especially in the wake of emotional trauma. I'm fairly sure he's killed because of it a time or two, though apparently only people he would've killed even when _not_ borderline crazy."

"So _that's_ why he hates to be alone," the older woman murmured. "Because he's afraid he'll go mad without someone around to keep him in check…"

"Exactly," Cagalli confirmed. "Now, most of the time he's perfectly fine; that's why Kira never noticed anything like that at Copernicus or Heliopolis… but at a time like this, when his past is in the forefront of his mind, his stability is a little uncertain." She sighed. "And… he's afraid of passing that on to our children."

Murrue nodded slowly. "And that's part of his shock at seeing what Max has become… I can't really blame him, though I'd think it's unlikely he'd pass that on."

"I think so, too," Cagalli agreed. "And so do his Prometheus geneticists, apparently; they think that, while the instability itself is inherent to his genetic modifications, the triggers are mostly the severe trauma he suffered six years ago. With my genetic influence, and without that kind of trauma, our children would most likely be fine."

"That's good to know," Murrue said thoughtfully. "Now you just need to convince Kevin of that… I do wonder, though, how Max fits into the whole dynastic equation. Or does she at all?"

Cagalli took another sip of her coffee. "Well, unbeknownst to Kevin, she's already managed to get paperwork filed that officially lists her as Kevin's daughter; as far as Orb is concerned, she _is_ his heir, and once Kevin gets over the shock I think he'll approve of the arrangement. What that means dynastically, though, is that, as of now, the Onishi Barony –or rather Walker, assuming he agrees to resume the title when we return- now has an heir. When we finally get married, Max will also become the heir of Orb itself, by default; despite the fact that she's not Kevin's heir by me, she'd still be considered legitimate… I think."

"Adopted heir, in other words."

"Basically, yeah," she acknowledged. "However, if and when we have a child _together,_ that child becomes the heir to the Athha family, while Max reverts to simply holding the Walker title. That serves to keep the two titles separate… though it'll be generations before another Walker can marry another Athha, given the connections between the two families. By the time the familial connections grow distant enough again, Orb may well be a thing of the past."

"Fascinating…" Murrue shook her head. "You know, I don't think I envy you people, really; it sounds very complicated."

Cagalli grimaced. "It is. I only got all that figured out a couple days ago, even though I started researching the matter as soon as I found out what Max had become."

Murrue raised an eyebrow. "Even though, by then, you and Kevin had separated?"

"It was a little before I agreed to the engagement, actually," the younger woman said with a grimace, "and afterward… Well, I guess I just couldn't bring myself to give up hope completely."

"Good thing you didn't; I don't really want to know what Kevin might've turned into had you two never reconciled."

"I think he would've found someone else," Cagalli said quietly. "I figured out a long time ago that his helmswoman has long had an interest in him… and I think Leona might, too. If it'd come to it, I think Kevin would've been happy with either of them. But," she said firmly, "I'm glad it _didn't_ come to that, because I don't think he'd have been as happy as he is now… and I _know_ I wouldn't have been happy. Not married to that bastard Yuna."

"You would've been a widow within a few years anyway," Kevin told her, stepping into the office. "I don't think it would've taken that idiot long to give me an excuse to assassinate him."

"Kevin!" Quickly setting aside her cup, Cagalli embraced the super-soldier tightly. "You had me worried for a little while, you know!"

He grinned, lightly stroking her hair. "Nah, I'm okay; just a bit of a shock, that's all." Indeed, his face had returned to its normal color… though that might've been due to manipulation through his augmentation, rather than a change in his emotional state. "It'll take more than that to put me down for the count."

"Yes," Murrue said dryly, "like depleted uranium slugs or nuclear weapons… You're sure you're all right, now?"

Kevin nodded, expression more serious. "Yeah. I imagine Cagalli's been explaining my… issues with having children… but now it looks like the point is moot, with the decision made without me. I'll… just have to get used to it, I guess."

"Yeah, you will," Cagalli told him firmly. "Because if you think that's the end of it…"

"Yeah, I figured that. However, discussions about that are kind of going to have to wait." He met her eyes, his own troubled. "The day after tomorrow, I'll have to be leaving the ship again for a little while."

She blinked, surprised. "Huh? But… why?"

"I got a message from Delta just before I launched for that last battle," he said quietly. "She told me… to meet her at the 'place of death in her homeland', and gave a specific date. That means I need to head for the old Chernobyl reactor site two days from now."

Cagalli frowned, worried. "But why would she want you to meet her _there…_ and what would she want to talk about?"

"I think I can answer the first question," Murrue said, speaking before Kevin could. "Because even N-jammers can't completely suppress radiation –otherwise radios wouldn't work at all- which means the reactor site is still radioactive… probably to the point that no normal Natural or Coordinator could long survive exposure."

"Actually," Kevin corrected, "the radiation level there is still fatal to normal humans after just a few seconds' exposure. Any longer, and you're the walking dead. Now, anyone produced by the Ultimate Coordinator project could tolerate it for somewhat longer than that, but only a Destroyer could effectively ignore it for long periods."

"So you'll have to go alone," Cagalli said unhappily. "Kevin, I don't want you going there without me, especially not to meet with _her."_

He sighed. "Cagalli, you're the _last_ person I'd want to bring with me. Not because I don't trust your skills, but because I… I can't afford to lose you. I don't know exactly what Delta wants to talk to me about, but I can easily see it escalating into violence… and I do _not_ want to see you hurt. If I lost you, I…"

She closed her eyes. "Kevin…"

"You know he's right, Cagalli," Murrue said quietly. "For all that you're skilled with firearms and unarmed combat, I don't think you're physically capable of fighting that woman. I've heard of the 'Legendary Mercenary', and I'd have to say it may well be true that only her greatest pupil can stand up to her in a fight." She gazed very seriously at the younger woman. "And I don't think you want to see Kevin's reaction to losing you any more than I do."

Cagalli winced, images of terrible, sweeping destruction appearing before her mind's eye. She knew that Kevin wouldn't react that way if she were to fall by natural causes, or by some freak accident on the battlefield… but if someone like Arkanian did it, his wrath against his instructor and the Chairman backing her would be terrifying.

"All right," she said at last, still troubled. "But you be careful out there, Kevin, or I swear I'll send Kira to take her out with the Freedom."

Kevin smiled reassuringly. "Hey, it won't come to that. Not even she can beat me _that_ badly, you know. It'll take more than one 'Legendary Mercenary' to defeat the Angel of Death."

* * *

"I still say these things feel weird," First Lieutenant Asagi Caldwell, Force Operation X pilot, muttered, rubbing the angular device embedded in her right palm. "I mean, I know these really help out our piloting, but still… I just don't understand how the Colonel can be so… so… _casual_ about his, like he doesn't even notice them."

"Colonel Walker's had his neural receptors for six years," First Lieutenant Juri Wu Nien pointed out. "We've had ours for only eighteen months."

"It's not so bad," First Lieutenant Mayura Labatt opined. "At least we didn't need the full package; just the receptors and the cortical implants."

"I never liked brain surgery," Asagi grumbled.

The three of them were in the cafeteria aboard the Prometheus Fleet Mobile Assault Ship _Dominion,_ waiting out the last few hours till the ship launched. They'd spent the last eighteen months at the Artemis Base, working up, and were eager to return to Earth.

They had all originally been Orb Union pilots, flying the original M1 Astrays; they had, in fact, been the test pilots for that machine, and continued to fly them throughout the first war after Orb was invaded by the Earth Alliance. After the war, though, Kevin Walker had recruited them for his own private military force, and from then on, their lives –and bodies- had been different.

Unlike other members of FOX, they'd received only the most basic of augmentation. That was partly because they had been the first recruits, and so arrived before most of the technology had been reverse-engineered; more importantly, though, they simply didn't _need_ the full package, because they were strictly mobile suit pilots, without the extra duties other members performed.

"If you think brain surgery was bad," a new voice said, "be glad you didn't go through the full treatment, mon ami." Wearing civilian clothing, the only concession to formality being the gold oak leaves of a major on the collar of her black jacket, Major Leona Colde eschewed the gray FOX uniforms the former Astray pilots wore in favor of a more casual look. "It didn't _hurt,_ exactly, but it felt… wrong, somehow."

"Major Colde!" Asagi said in surprise, instinctively snapping to attention. "We didn't hear you come in!"

Leona laughed, and waved a hand; formality wasn't something she was particularly obsessive about. "At ease," she advised. "After all, Kevin's units aren't exactly as formal as the Orb military; no need to stand on ceremony all the time."

"Uh, yes, Major," Asagi said, flustered. "Um… may I ask why you're here, Ma'am?"

"I thought I'd see how you were doing," the older woman replied, "Get your opinion on things. For example, I suppose you three have had some time to accustom yourselves to using neural implants?"

"A little," Juri admitted. "They still feel weird, like Asagi was saying earlier, but we're getting the hang of them. So far, we've mostly done simulations, but controlling our actual mobile suits is getting easier, too."

"You mean you had difficulty at first?" Leona said curiously. "I remember from battle records that Kevin used Punisher's neural interlink without any trouble, that first time, and I haven't had any problems…"

"He was also more experienced with augmentation systems in general than even Commander Tyler," Juri pointed out. "He'd been a Destroyer for a little over three years by then, with some tough on-the-job training, or so I've heard. And you've already been enhanced with Colonel Walker's DNA, which may have made things easier."

"That makes sense," Leona conceded. "His genotype is better adjusted, possibly helped by Destroyer gene therapy. Hm…"

"Um, Major…" Asagi began, when the older woman fell silent, "if it's not out of line, may I ask what our duties are likely to be, once we reach Earth?"

Leona waved a hand. "Of course it isn't out of line, Lieutenant; the more you know about what you're expected to do, the more you'll be able to prepare yourself. At any rate, I understand _Dominion_ will first rendezvous with _Archangel,_ where we'll pick up Flay Allster, Jack Carter, Commander Badgiruel, Commander Tyler, and the zombie wolfman that turned up in Tibet. After that, Miss Allster will be sent on up to space, while I transfer over to _Archangel,_ and _Dominion_ –along with the three of you- heads off to liaison with the _Minerva,_ as well as try and hunt down any of Baron Onishi's minions and attempt to locate the _Concepcion…_ along with the mobile suit that was taken off the ship."

Juri nodded slowly. "It'll be a big job," she said somberly. "Colonel Walker is trusting us with a lot, if we're the only FOX pilots he's sending along… So, when do we leave?"

"_Attention,"_ the ship's PA system said, _"all hands, prepare for launch. Our departure has been moved up, and we're leaving immediately. I suggest all crew members strap in… and pilots should be ready to launch at any time. We'll be leaving the hyper-jammer area of effect shortly, and we'll be vulnerable till we're past atmospheric reentry."_

"That's our cue," Leona noted. "We'd better suit up, girls; there are plenty of people out there who don't like us."

* * *

"I've just gotten word from Artemis," Kevin announced, stepping onto _Archangel_'s Bridge, Cagalli –as usual- at his side. _"Dominion_ is on her way down now. That means we'll soon be able to get some of our passengers off our hands… and I'll be able to send someone to try and find out what happened to _Concepcion,_ and where Foxhound is."

Before Murrue could respond, a grunt came from the bow, where another sandy-haired soldier stood on the walkway in front of the forward viewport. "Good," Jack Carter remarked. "No offense, Walker, but while I'm willing to maintain this truce, I don't really want to stay on the same ship with you any longer than I have to."

"Likewise, I'm sure," Murrue murmured. "Well, that _is_ good news, Kevin… better news than I expect is coming next. It's been two days since the battle, after all."

Kevin nodded soberly. "That's right, Murrue. I'm leaving within the hour."

"I'm still not so sure you should take the risk, Kevin," Cagalli said in concern. "Meeting with that woman, especially without any backup… It could be dangerous, and you know it."

The super-soldier sighed. "I know, Cagalli, and I wish I didn't have to do it. But I _do_ have to, because one way or another this has to be resolved. Eventually, Delta is _going_ to catch up with me, and I'd just as soon get it over with while she's still willing to at least talk. This meeting could well get violent," he conceded unwillingly, "but tough as that woman is, I believe I can at least hold her off long enough for me to escape."

(_I still think you should let me go along as backup,_) Kira said silently, leaning against the port bulkhead. (_I could…_)

Kevin shook his head. (_No, Kira. For one thing, Freedom's weapons would be effectively useless against Delta; if even that fancy targeting computer can keep up with a Destroyer running at full capacity, I'll be much surprised. Not to mention that your plasma cannons, for example, wouldn't do any good against an active AKWES field. And as for ground combat, leaving aside the severe radiation issues –which even you couldn't ignore for more than a few minutes- you simply aren't trained to deal with someone like her._)

(_I've seen _you_ fight,_) Kira said stubbornly. (_I can actually see you move, Kevin; I can react in time against a Destroyer, especially if the Archetype really doesn't have systems up to your level._)

(_True enough,_) Kevin conceded, (_but it's not just your physical condition that matters. Kira, Natalya Ivanova Arkanian has spent her entire adult live on the battlefield, and she's thirty-five; that's seventeen years, maybe a little more, spent in the art of war… and she's an expert in armed and unarmed combat. You, on the other hand, are an expert mobile suit pilot, but ground combat is not something you've practiced much. I know you're a good shot with a pistol, but you know as well as I do that firearms won't do squat against her._)

Kira stared at him several moments longer, then sighed. (_All right, Kevin. Just… be careful. I don't even want to know how Cagalli would react if you didn't come back._)

"Likewise," Kevin said aloud. "Which is why I'm going to be _extremely_ careful."

"You'd better be," Cagalli said fiercely, having missed the silent exchange. "Because if anything happens to you, I swear I'll have Artemis build another Foxhound, and tell Leona to do whatever she has to avenge you."

Inwardly, the super-soldier winced; he wasn't at all sure she was bluffing… "I will be, Cagalli. And I _will_ come back… I promise."

* * *

Forty-five minutes later, MBF-M1000B Nemesis was airborne, riding the raw power of matter-antimatter collision to attain an acceleration other mobile suits could only dream of… and most pilots would be unable to tolerate.

Even so, the journey from the Indian Ocean to Ukraine would take several hours; the machine had to cover nearly nine _thousand_ kilometers, after all. And that gave Kevin Walker, formerly known by the codename "Hydra", plenty of time to watch the scenery… and reflect on what had occurred over the past months.

One of the most notable changes, Kevin mused, gazing out through Nemesis' optical systems, was the color of the sky. Break The World had affected the entire planet, with whole cities being obliterated by debris… and much of that debris had ended up in the upper atmosphere, blasted their by impact. By now, the familiar blue of the sky was gone, shading more toward purple…

Even with his lifespan, it might be so long before the planet fully recovered that the old blue would remain only in his childhood memories, never again to be scene with his own eyes. _Is this the price of freedom?_ Kevin wondered, looking up to the moon, just beginning to rise. On that same orbital path, Junius Seven had once floated, beyond the ravages of Earth… _Is the price of our survival the loss of that which makes our lives what they are… to have to fight off bitter, vengeful soldiers who simply want it all to end because of the actions of a few?_

At least the sea belong was still as it had always been. Junius Seven's fall had caused earthquakes and massive tsunamis, but the sea was the same. _Which lasts longer,_ he thought, recalling an old saying, _the mountains… or the sea? It looks like we finally have empirical evidence of that…_

He himself was solid as a rock, his body toughened by modifications and by years on the battlefield… but he'd changed, these last six years. Six years ago, he'd have been flying to this meeting to reunite with his instructor and his team, to carry on their mission… but now, he went to meet her in order to try and sever his ties to that past once and for all.

_Are you watching this, Rachel?_ Kevin thought, sending his futile call on the wings of his empathic sense. _Are you still there in some form, watching the same sky I am? I suppose you'd be saddened to know what's happened in the last few years… how your birthplace was lost in nuclear fire, and then used by extremists in an attempt to destroy Earth… I know you never would've desired vengeance. I guess… you might even be disappointed in _me,_ for choosing the path I have; for choosing to bring my own form of "justice" to bear on those who made us._

_I hope you could understand, though. This is… the only way I could ever hope to atone for what I did. It was my hand, my fangs that did the deed, and so I suppose I am the one who deserves that fate… but there are still those who count on me. I can't let myself go, not so long as my friends –and Cagalli- rely on me. So I take the only recourse I can, by destroying those who made my betrayal of you possible._

He sighed, sweeping Nemesis through the skies above what was once known as Saudi Arabia. _I miss you, tovarisch, more than you could ever know. My real heart always belonged to someone else… but even now, I would value you as a friend… a friend I could trust above almost all others. You were… the one I trusted most, back then, even more than Mike or Alec._

_Mike's gone now, too, of course; and for that, I'm truly sorry. He was… my brother, even if he never knew it… committing fratricide made it even worse than it already was. Alec's still alive, though; I guess you'd be glad to know your brother's fine. I don't think he's forgiven me even yet –in fact, if it could've been done without blowing his cover, I guess he'd probably have punched my lights out- but we can hold a civilized conversation… and one day, we might even be true friends again. One day, I hope to bring what's left of the unit back together. A reunion of brothers in arms, of comrades… of the best friends any of us ever had._

Kevin sighed again, as his long journey brought him over the Black Sea; the final leg of his journey, most of it already behind him as he spoke to his dead comrade. _Unfortunately… I now go to a meeting that may reunite us sooner than I'd hope, tovarisch. I fly to meet with Delta, who's resurrected that cursed program… and wants me to return. I think that, even if you can't forgive what I did to you, you could at least understand why… I'd never go back to them. At least, I hope so… tovarisch._

_I'm sorry…for everything. Perhaps in another life, things could've gone our way… but Fate always kept us apart…_

Nemesis was over Ukraine, now… and the scenery _below_ caught his attention for the first time. He seemed to be flying over a Eurasian base… or rather, what was _left_ of it. "What the devil happened here…?" he whispered to himself, seeing the charred, blackened remnants of buildings, fixed defenses, and even ravaged mobile suits. "What could've done this? Unless… No…"

Kevin slowed his headlong pace, and came in low over the base. Bringing every scanner Nemesis possessed to bear on the wreckage, he examined it minutely… and within moments, his mouth tightened. Residue from high-energy plasma weaponry… and cuts in several mobile suits that had marks from a kind of blade only one mobile suit carried. The traces were difficult to detect, but he knew exactly what to look for.

Foxhound had been here.

_So whoever stole my mobile suit already has a pilot for it… and sufficient understanding of the technologies involved not to instantly crash. For that matter, you'd need a fair understanding just to make it _move…_ and only an augmented pilot could do even that._

Kevin frowned to himself. He rather suspected that this attack was a test run, made to evaluate Foxhound's capabilities… and he also suspected the attack had been made on fission power alone. He had no doubt someone else could eventually understand how to keep the antimatter reactor stable, but he highly doubted it could be done in the short time that had passed since Foxhound's theft.

_Yet even without full power, they did this… Nichevo. This was an utter, deliberate massacre; maybe they wanted to intimidate the Eurasians… or maybe they knew _I_ was coming, and wanted to intimidate _me.

On second thought, though, it was unlikely this was truly directed at him. No, whether it was ZAFT or his father behind it, it was merely coincidence that brought him over it. _I doubt they'd have wanted me to know they've already figured out how to use it this well… I think._

Flying low and slow over the wrecked mobile suits, Kevin frowned, and took a closer look at the lead Dagger L. Missing its limbs, head, and most of its torso, there was one difference between it and the other destroyed machines littering the base.

Its cockpit area was intact… and the hatch was open, clearly due to human intervention and not battle damage.

"So the mobile suit commander was spared," Kevin murmured, "and evacuated… but by who? And why?"

That was a question he couldn't yet answer… and didn't have the time to try to. He'd come this way for a reason, and this base was an enigma that would simply have to wait, until his pressing business was completed… one way or the other.

Nemesis flew onward.

* * *

Standing in the ruins of the greatest nuclear disaster –as opposed to attack- in human history, Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, codename Delta, watched her old student's mobile suit approach. As she expected her old student to be, she was wearing black civilian clothing; this was no place for uniforms to be seen. _I hope he doesn't get _too_ close,_ she thought clinically, _before he lands. I'd rather not have an N-jammer canceler too close to this place; who knows what that might do to the background radiation…_

Fortunately, it was clear Hydra hadn't lost all sense in the years since she'd trained him. The Nemesis set down a hundred and fifty meters from the Chernobyl reactor facility; probably more than was necessary, but Hydra clearly wasn't inclined to take chances with anything nuclear.

After a few moments, main power clearly went down –though phase-shift remained active; he was apparently paranoid, in addition to being careful… a trait his teacher applauded- and the hatch popped open, allowing the black-clad figure to exit. As Arkanian had expected, he didn't bother with a zipline; he simply leapt down to the ground, then made a leisurely five-kilometer-per-hour jog over to the facility itself.

_He doesn't look much like an aristocrat right now, _Arkanian noted. _I guess it's true that he's cast off that cloak, and returned to who he truly is… the Hydra. Or Crimson Tiger, perhaps; it's unlikely he's retained the codename that vnyebrachnyi Oracle gave him, however appropriate it may be. Still, might as well find out for myself…_

"I'm glad you could make it, Hydra," Delta said smoothly, when the youth stopped a cautious five meters from her. "It's been a while since I saw you in your true persona."

"Save it, Delta," Kevin advised coolly, adjusting the crimson bandana that kept his ragged sandy hair out of his eyes, and then withdrew and lit a cigarette. "I don't acknowledge that name anymore; the only titles I use are Captain –or mostly Colonel, considering my ground forces training- and Angel of Death. Since we've both been with ZAFT at one time or another, and since the latter title is quite the mouthful, why don't we just stick with names?"

"Very well, Kevin Ivanovich," Arkanian said agreeably. "I can understand why you'd want to at least cast _that_ away. Now, though… shall we get down to business."

"Not yet," he said firmly, eyes flashing behind the shades. "I came across quite the interesting scene on my way in here. A Eurasian base outside Dnepropetrovsk, in total ruin; burnt buildings, smashed defenses, and wrecked mobile suits everywhere. You got an explanation for that?"

Delta raised an eyebrow. "Might I ask why you think I might?"

"Because a week ago, a prototype mobile suit was stolen before it could be delivered to me," Kevin said bluntly. "MBF-X15A/M Foxhound. My cargo ship, _Concepcion,_ was attacked while approaching rendezvous with the _Archangel,_ and hasn't been heard from since Captain Daniels reported they were under fire. Are you telling me ZAFT had nothing to do with that?"

Arkanian shrugged. "If I knew, tovarisch, I would tell you; however, even if ZAFT _was_ behind both the Foxhound theft and the base's destruction, I wouldn't necessarily know about it. I know more about Chairman Durandal's plans than most people, but even I am operating on a need-to-know basis. And, frankly, I don't have the need to know. Any such operation would be outside my purview unless it directly affected your own status, Kevin Ivanovich."

"I see…" His eyes narrowed. "Then how about that attack on my home? What were Mongoose and Meerkat doing there… and why did you decide to kill my family?"

_This is the tricky part,_ Delta thought. _I dare not tell him the truth; not yet. Not until he understands that what we seek is important enough to take drastic measures… and that the Chairman's error in judgment is one brought about by stress –I think- and that it won't happen again…_

"Their attack was launched without my knowledge, tovarisch," she said at last. "Had I known of it, I would've done my best to stop it; as it was, I lost two of my best agents, after all." She tilted her head.

"What of Miss Clyne? Did she survive?"

"Yes," Kevin said quietly. "And you'd better be glad of that. Because whether you were directly involved or not, the presence of two of _your_ hand-picked people would've made you partly responsible for her death… and that would've brought about yours." He clenched his cybernetic hand. "So, if you didn't order it… who did?"

"I hope you don't expect me to answer that question," Delta said, equally quiet. "Not yet. I know your reputation too well, Kevin; you would seek that person out with vengeful intent before it could be understood what led to such an error in the first place."

"_Error?"_ he repeated. "Oh, that was _far_ more than a mere 'error', Natalya Ivanova." His eyes were jade ice behind his shades. "Be glad my vengeance is cold, old comrade. I'll leave it at that for now… but with or without your help, the one responsible _will_ pay for their deeds."

"That depends," Arkanian said slowly. "Because the time has come for you to make a choice, tovarisch. You understand that, don't you?"

"It doesn't exactly surprise me, no," Kevin conceded, feeling a chill go down his back… and combat programs begin to flicker to life within his body. "That's why you called me here, isn't it?"

"Da." Her silver eyes bored into his own, meeting his gaze with an almost frightening intensity. "I told you, when we met in Orb, that I wouldn't blame you if you chose to stay out of this war entirely. I told you I would respect that… but I also warned you of what would happen if you chose to enter this war as a free lance. You are one of us, tovarisch, one of the Destroyers; we are warriors beyond men, and the presence of a rogue of such power is too dangerous to be permitted. Even you should understand that I cannot allow you to go your own way so long as you choose to flaunt your power."

Kevin's hands flexed unconsciously. "So you're giving me a choice… between supporting your ideals… and death? Is that what you're saying?"

"You belong with _us,_ Kevin Ivanovich," Delta said firmly. "Whether your original participation was voluntary or not, you are one of our breed… and it is our breed that will lead the world into the future. That goal is far more important than whatever you may be doing now… and for that matter, it doesn't even conflict with your existing loyalties, really. If you rejoin us, you'll find that what we're doing is, in the end, a far better way to protect those you love."

The man once called Hydra slowly shook his head. "Sorry, 'tovarisch', but I gave up on idealism a long time ago. I'll protect Cagalli myself, with my own proud fist." He met his teacher's gaze squarely. "You can talk about 'warriors beyond men' and the breed that will lead the world into the future all you want… but the fact is that we're as human as they are. Men granted the power of Titans… but still _men."_

Arkanian's eyes narrowed. "So that's your decision, is it? To make your own way, casting aside your true path, your true destiny?"

"I shape my own destiny," Kevin fired back. "My Fate is to follow my own course, unfettered by the likes of you. I abandoned my mission years ago, and I'm not about to return to it now. You can tell Durandal the same thing I'm telling you: it'll be a cold day in hell before I consider rejoining the people who made me what I am… before I leave Cagalli's side."

"You truly belief in this course?" she asked quietly, watching him carefully.

"I do."

"Are you willing to die for that belief?"

Kevin's chin lifted defiantly. "I am." Then his metal hand clenched into a fist… and a sixty-centimeter blade of nanite-altered metal slowly grew out of his sleeve, forming into his preferred melee weapon. "But it ain't exactly Plan A."

Arkanian's hand descended to her right boot, and drew a twenty-centimeter, partially-serrated tanto-style combat knife from the sheath there. "I'm sorry to hear that, tovarisch," she said sincerely. "It sounds like I'll just have to insert some sense into you with my hands, just as when you got uppity in training."

"Uppity, is it? No… I'm the one with the sense this time, Delta." He raised his arm, the long blade now positioned protectively in front of his body, and settled into a combat stance. "This time… I'm not backing down, no matter what."

His teacher raised her own weapon. "Then prepare yourself for the consequences of that decision, O Angel of Death," she advised.

"I already have. So… let's dance!"

Kevin catapulted himself forward, covering the five-meter gap in a single leap, and slashed down with his incredibly keen blade… only to hit nothing but air. _What the-! I didn't even see her move!_

"Too slow," Delta remarked, standing behind him.

He spun around, whipping his arm blade in a horizontal arc… which passed through empty air as she leapt nimbly away again. _Not possible,_ a corner of his mind whispered. _That speed…_ He launched himself after her, only to find that she had, once again, vanished without him even seeing her move.

"Over here," she said dryly, now standing atop the old reactor chamber itself. "Or have you turned into a sloth since our last bout?"

Kevin allowed himself a brief snarl –and a muttered Russian obscenity- as his legs propelled him into another mighty leap. Twisting around mid-leap, he landed behind her, thrust his blade forward… and had it stopped dead by her knife. _What-?_

"Never over-extend your thrust," Delta advised, and jumped away; with the sudden release of opposing pressure against his weapon, Kevin stumbled forward, and had to turn a budding fall into an awkward jump to the ground.

By then, she'd vanished again, and his senses –natural, empathic, and mechanical- sought her out. She was managing to block his empathy, which wasn't very surprising, but it made anticipating her more difficult than he liked. _Still, she has to be- There!_

But by the time his blade lashed out at the implant signature behind him, she'd already moved again, and he had to check his own motion. _What the devil is going on here? She hasn't even attacked, and yet-!_

"Pathetic," Delta observed, balancing on a twisted girder. "I'm almost surprised Mongoose and Meerkat lost to you; but perhaps they truly weren't as good as I'd hoped… or perhaps you're simply more dangerous when cornered."

"So corner me and fight out," Kevin hissed, tiring of the battle. "Because if you don't do something soon, I'll just leave, and let you try and catch Nemesis."

"No, I'm afraid I can't allow that, actually. You're not leaving here unless it's with me… whether you're conscious or not." Arkanian blurred into motion, charging her student.

He snapped up his blade… but he was too slow, somehow. Her combat knife brushed it aside… and plunged into his breastbone, penetrating the center all the way to his spine.

"Gah!" A tortured gasp escaped Kevin's lips as the blade touched something, and his entire body froze up. He stared, disbelieving, at Arkanian… and slowly, ever so slowly, toppled backwards.

_Not… possible…_ he thought, in the eternal moments it took his body to fall. _I've… never lost… a serious fight… in my life…_ He was stunned beyond comprehension. Outside of training with his comrades, years before, he had _never_ lost in single combat. He'd been shot dead by a sniper, and been mauled in mobile suit battles, but never before had he had been defeated this way. _And with only… one blow…_ _Now I can't even…move my body…_

Kevin Walker slammed hard into the ground, and Arkanian shook her head. "Pathetic," she said again. "For all your talk of how we're 'only human', it was _you_ who relied on brute power. You also forgot one very important thing: every move you know, _I_ taught you… and I didn't teach you every move I know. Moreover, despite your apparent research into your own systems, you obviously never discovered the design flaw in your spine: when the neural relay implanted in that particular vertebrae is touched, your nervous system virtually shuts down, instantly. Medical Section never was entirely certain why, but they were working on a corrective measure…until you blew them up."

_Well, that explains why I can't move,_ he thought distantly. _That vnyebrachnyi… she'll pay for this…_

Arkanian blinked as she literally _felt_ a blast of frustrated rage from the immobilized soldier. "Hm," she mused, kneeling next to him, "it appears your rumored 'sixth sense' is no rumor at all… and if you're angry enough, even others can feel it. Fascinating… Well, I'm afraid you'll be coming with me now, tovarisch; hopefully I can convince you to be more reasonable when we're in a more congenial setting. First, though… I'd best do some research."

Kevin knew what was coming next, but despite his anger, he couldn't do anything to stop his teacher as she touched her left palm to his… and established a connection between their neural receptors.

Delta was uninterested in his personal memories; even had the connection between implant and organic memory not been so heavily secured, she was not a voyeur. Invading his privacy was not her aim. Instead, she sought the data locked in his cortical implant… data on what kind of advanced research his "Prometheus" project had been conducting.

Closing her eyes, she concentrated on the data flow, her mind delving deep into the system. The first firewalls fell easily; they were still the Destroyer defaults, which meant she had the codes to unlock them. Soon came more difficult barriers, several of which she ignored. Data on the Freedom or the _Archangel_ didn't interest her; ZAFT still had complete data on the Freedom –for all the good it did them- and _Archangel_ had been fought enough times in the past for sufficient battle data to have been gathered long since.

Soon enough, though, she was approaching his central data area, and though Kevin tried to forcibly eject her from the system, she quickly uncovered several pieces of trivia; it was clear, for example, that he had near-complete data on the old ABADDON research programs. _But that's not what I'm looking for…Ah!_

Delta had now achieved access into the surface layer of his innermost data storage area; in her mind's eye, a deep chamber his own mind labeled as "Terminal Dogma", where his deepest secrets lay. So far, all she could see were project codenames, but even that… _EPR transmission,_ she noted, _fold system… _Mars_-class assault carrier… _Prometheus_-class-_

_**WARNING. CODEWORD CLEARANCE REQUIRED. ACCESS DENIED. RETRACT. RETRACT. RETRACT.**_

Arkanian's eyes snapped open, startled by the strength of Kevin's "Terminal" defenses, and then prepared to mount a massive cybernetic assault.

_CRACK._

The bullet that slammed into the side of her head took her completely by surprise, and severed the computer link as the impact shock broke the physical connection between their neural receptors. "Get away from him, you witch!"

Arkanian's head snapped around, her internal systems already fighting the blinding headache the bullet had caused –her AKWES system effectively disabled by radiation, there had been nothing to interdict the projectile- and she came to her feet just as the newcomer came into view. "Who are you?" she demanded. His long black hair and amethyst eyes reminded her of someone else, but the formfitting black clothing –along with what seemed to be light armor at his wrists and shoulders- didn't look at all familiar to her.

"Shut up," the young man said succinctly, aiming a heavy-caliber pistol directly at her throat. "Just get away from him, or the next shot takes off your entire head!"

Arkanian's lips curled in a snarl, but the way he held his weapon -and the fact that the radiation hadn't killed him yet- told her engaging him would be a bad idea just then. Whoever he was, he was clearly aware of a Destroyer's vulnerable areas… and his resistance to radiation implied a body almost as heavily altered –at least on the genetic level- as Kevin's. That could mean faster reflexes than she anticipated…

"Another time, then," she said with grudging respect. "But try to follow me, and we'll see who dies!" Whirling around with cybernetic speed, she leapt away, heading out of the reactor facility at a speed no unaugmented soldier could match.

"Witch," the tough young man muttered again, and holstered his pistol. "She'll pay for that sometime… You okay, Kevin?" he added, kneeling next to the prostrate soldier.

"I'll… live…" Kevin managed. "Can't… move, though…"

"I know. That witch short-circuited your nervous system; and no, I don't know how." The older man –though he himself looked no older than twenty-one- got an arm under Kevin's shoulder, and managed to heave him to his feet. "Man, you're heavy, you know that? What did you have for breakfast, lead?"

"Toast… with a side dish of… stainless steel," the super-soldier answered, in all seriousness. "Great source of… raw material for my… internal systems…" He drew on every ounce of strength in his body, and managed to turn his head. "Thanks… Canard…"

"Forget it," Canard Pars grunted. "When Prometheus called about your 'meeting' with that witch, I figured I should drop by. I'm not about to let _you_ die… or whatever it was she was trying to do to you."

"She tried to… access my onboard data," Kevin told him. "Top secret projects… stuff we haven't… quite figured out… yet. If ZAFT got that data… could be ugly…"

"I'll take your word for it." Grimacing at his friend's weight, Canard got them both out of the facility, and toward the pair of mobile suits that stood outside. "As you can see, I brought Dreadnought; if you can bring Nemesis out on remote, I'll take you back to the _Archangel_ in my machine."

"Thanks," Kevin said sincerely. "I don't know how well… Dreadnought can fly… so I'll switch Nemesis to mobile armor mode. We can… ride that out to the ship."

"Good plan." Canard shook his head. "If I were you, though, I'd stick to that for a while; don't go after that witch again until you figure out how she beat you like that."

"That's exactly… my intention…" Kevin agreed, as they limped over to YMF-X000A/H Dreadnought H; formerly piloted by a young man named Prayer Reverie, Canard had inherited his own nemesis' machine –along with its pilot's ideals, to some extent- and modified it with technology from his old CAT1-X1/3 Hyperion.

The friendship between the two soldiers, both products of the Ultimate Coordinator Project, was somewhat unlikely; the first time they'd met, Canard had been intent on killing Kira Yamato… a mission which had earned Kevin's ire. The two had fought on the beach below Onishi Mansion, which ended up with Canard breaking several bones –along with his nose- and having an X-shaped scar slashed across the bridge of his nose by Kevin's arm blade.

After that misunderstanding, though, the two of them had discovered they had much in common in their pasts. Both had been products of Ulen Hibiki's experiments, leaving a lasting genetic effect on their lives… and both of them had spent time as both scientific guinea pigs and recipients of torture, as well as being used as super-soldiers by their captors. Canard's had been longer than Kevin's, but the wiry Destroyer's had actually been more intense, however brief it might've been.

As such, they were effectively two of a kind, understanding each other better than most people understood either of them… and when one was in danger, the other would likely turn up before long.

Canard Pars was, in fact, one of a tiny number of people Kevin Walker trusted absolutely.

"So," Canard said now, "what's your next move? Take out that witch, or…?"

"Delta can wait," Kevin said painfully, as some of his motor control began to return to normal. "First, I need to find out what happened to Foxhound. I don't know if you saw it, but there's a wrecked base nearby that Foxhound apparently wiped out in what seems to have been a test run."

Canard winced. "Better find it quick; I don't want _that_ thing on my tail." He glanced at Kevin's face, still tight with pain. "Who do you think it was? ZAFT… or Onishi?"

"Not sure," Kevin admitted. "Even Arkanian didn't know for sure, so I guess I'll just have to find out for myself." His expression tightened more, but with determination instead of pain. "And whoever did it… will regret it."

"I'll do what I can from my end," Canard promised. "I might be able to dig something up… and if I take it down first, I'll make sure Foxhound gets back to you."

"Spasiba, tovarisch."

The two of them made their way to Dreadnought, ready for the journey back to _Archangel…_ and both preparing for their own parts in the journey ahead.

* * *

Author's note

* * *

Foxhound has been used in combat for the first time, by those who captured it… and it becomes clear the weapon may be more than even its creator can deal with, in the hands of the enemy. Meanwhile, another group has surfaced, identity unknown, but mission similar to Kevin Walker's…

The man once called Hydra has fought his instructor for the first time in over five years, and lost; only time will tell if he can overcome his teacher's advantage…

Well, I do believe this chapter is ready faster than the last couple; and, I daresay, rather more interesting than the last couple. I suppose I've probably also driven people made, wondering what these _new_ revelations will lead to… but I suppose that's par for the course. Anyway, let me know how it was. –Solid Shark


	18. Chapter 18: The Undead

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk**

* * *

Cagalli Yula Athha was once again waiting in the _Archangel_'s hangar when her boyfriend's mobile suit returned… but this time, she was genuinely worried about him. He had signaled the ship several hours earlier, via his quantum radio implant, to assure everyone he was still alive… but he'd also stated he was returning with Canard Pars, instead of under his own power.

The thought of what might've happened had made her blood run cold.

Now, seeing the Dreadnought H set down on the deck, the remotely-controlled Nemesis landing next to it, she could only wait impatiently for the older machine's hatch to open.

When it finally did, Canard was the first one down, lowering himself to the deck on a zipline before stepping aside to let Kevin Walker drop lightly to the deck himself… though not as lightly as he usually did.

Cagalli barely even acknowledged Canard's presence before launching herself at Kevin. "You idiot!" she berated, embracing him tightly. "What happened to you? Why did you have to be carried here? What did that woman _do_ to you?"

_Same old Cagalli,_ Kevin thought fondly, returning the embrace. "Hey, now," he said softly, "one question at a time… and at least I'm still in one piece, right?"

"Which is more than could be said if I hadn't turned up in the nick of time," Canard said dryly, running a hand through his shoulder-length black hair. "Be grateful he wasn't alone at the end, Cagalli."

Cagalli finally looked over at him, and smiled. "I am, Canard, really… but I also want to know what happened. I know Kevin was worried about the meeting, but this…"

"I think we'd all like to know that," Murrue remarked, stepping in with Kira and Andy in tow. "I wouldn't think you'd bring Canard into things for no reason, Kevin."

"Yeah," Kira agreed. "We're not used to _you_ needing help. Not for something like that." He turned toward Canard, noting absently –not for the first time- how much the older pilot resembled him. "Thanks, Canard, for helping him out."

Canard shrugged. "Don't mention it. I wasn't about to let him die, that's all."

"…She wasn't going to kill me," Kevin said slowly, eyes shadowed even more than his shades could account for. "If that had been her intention, Delta could've done it easily enough." He winced, rubbing his head. "As it was, she gave me a devil of a headache… and she took me down with one blow."

Kira inhaled sharply, and Andy's eyebrows went up. "You?" the Desert Tiger said in surprise. "She took _you_ down with only one strike?"

Kevin sighed. "It was partly my own fault," he admitted. "Delta was right about that: for all my talk about how we're still human, however powerful we may be, I _do_ rely on my strength to get me through things, and it's worked so well in the past that I've become arrogant. She used my preference for single, punishing attacks against me." His expression darkened. "And, I think, something else. Half the time during that fight, I couldn't even see her."

"Optic camouflage?" Murrue suggested. "Destroyers have used that often enough; just look at John."

He shook his head. "Nyet. Optic camouflage doesn't activate _quite_ instantly, and in any case my augmentation would've been able to compensate for any purely optical concealment. No, I'm fairly sure she was managing a real-time optical _hacking,_ preventing my eyes from registering her image even when other sensors attempted to display that data to my optic nerves."

Andy frowned. "That's some pretty fast hacking, especially in the middle of a bout of single combat."

"She's on a whole other level from me, Andy; I'd forgotten just how much. Also, she knows my systems better than almost anyone else… and if her actions _after_ she brought me down are any indication, she knows more than I'd like." Kevin's frown deepened. "After stabbing me through the chest, and hitting some kind of critical node in my spine, she accessed the neural receptor in my left hand, and tried a direct approach, hacking my onboard database."

Murrue's gaze sharpened. "She didn't penetrate the Terminal Dogma data, did she?"

"Not quite," Canard interjected dryly. "I shot the witch the head before she could recover from the migraine Kevin's defenses gave her."

It was Kira's turn to frown. "Terminal Dogma?" he repeated.

"Sensitive Prometheus data," Andy explained. "Racher here usually carries that kind of data in his head just so that he knows what can be called in at any given time; and because he sometimes thinks of his own contributions to the designs. Anyway, that section of his implant memory contains complete schematics of the _Prometheus_-class battleships, the Foxhound –and files explaining the key needed to unlock Foxhound's complete capabilities- research data on several of Prometheus' projects, and intelligence data regarding Mars."

"The Mars data probably isn't a big deal, as far as ZAFT is concerned," Kevin said pensively. "I'd rather _Mars_ not find out how much we've been keeping an eye on them, but I doubt ZAFT would care at all. The other data, now… I do _not_ want ZAFT getting a hold of any of the technical information. If they are indeed the ones who took Foxhound –and Delta would neither confirm nor deny the possibility; she simply said that if it's true, she doesn't have need-to-know- that would allow them to operate it even more effectively than they did in Ukraine."

"Foxhound's already been deployed?" Murrue said sharply. "When?"

"Recently," Canard filled in. "I passed over the site myself. Sometime in the past two days, Peter the Great Base in Ukraine was attacked and destroyed by something using sabers with the same characteristics as Foxhound's… buster-class plasma weaponry. Unless you people have another mobile suit unaccounted for, it was there."

Cagalli frowned, worried. "That isn't good," she said quietly. "If that thing's as good as you say, and it's already on the loose… Were there any survivors from the Eurasian base?"

Kevin nodded slowly. "I believe so. A single defending mobile suit still had an intact cockpit… with no one inside. My belief is that the pilot was spared, possibly in order to spread word of a threat from the shadows –presumably psych-warfare- and then somebody picked him up. The question that's bothering me is… who rescued him? I checked with Artemis on the way back, and judging from Eurasian radio traffic _they_ still don't know what hit them."

"Hm…" Andy frowned in thought. "Not the Earth Forces, then, and presumably not ZAFT… That does still leave two possibilities, assuming Onishi wasn't responsible for the attack itself: his people… and whoever it was that gutted _Amaterasu,_ six years ago."

"It won't be Father," Kevin said, shaking his head. "I've an unpleasant feeling that he already knows more about my activities than I'd prefer, and he wouldn't really _need_ an eyewitness report in the first place."

"Agreed," Murrue concurred. "My guess is that either he was picked up by locals, people who don't have any connection to any group… or by whatever group attacked _Amaterasu_."

Canard turned back toward Dreadnought H. "It's quite a mess, whatever the truth is," he said over his shoulder. "I'll do some digging of my own; can't make any promises, but quite frankly, I don't want to have to face that thing, either."

"Be careful, Canard," Kira requested. "If you do encounter it…"

The older pilot snorted. "I know a few tricks of my own, don't worry. See you around…"

Without further ado, he climbed back into Dreadnought's cockpit, reactivated the mobile suit, and moved to the catapult.

As he was leaving, Kevin shook his head. "That guy's even more of a maverick than I am, sometimes," he murmured. "And with that attitude… to think he's Kira's older brother…" He shrugged, almost to himself. "Well, I'm sure he'll be fine. He hasn't made it this far by being a substandard pilot."

"Yeah," Cagalli agreed. "Speaking of 'fine', though… how are _you_ doing? You said Arkanian took you down with just one move…"

The super-soldier shrugged again. "I should probably drop by the Infirmary," he conceded. "Nonetheless, the physical damage was superficial, and aside from a puncture all the way to my spine, the damage was limited to messing up my augmentation. Once I get that reset –and start working on a way to deal with that buggy neural relay- I should be okay, too."

She sighed in relief. "Good. You know, Kevin, I _told_ you I didn't want you meeting her alone… If Canard hadn't shown up, where you be now?"

He shivered. "I don't think we want to know the answer to that question, really; I have enough bad memories of the original project as it is." _Which reminds me… if our hypothesis about the origin of that DiaSteel is correct, then I need to go back someday soon… and hope I don't find what I fear. The final product… the unlucky number…_ Kevin shook himself, burying the old memories yet again. "Anyway," he said aloud, "where to next? We can't stay here forever, after all."

Murrue nodded. "I know. That's why we're on our way around Africa; we're on our way to Scandinavia, which has managed to stay neutral this time around, at least for now. I'd prefer to take the Suez Canal, bypassing the Cape of Good Hope entirely by taking the Mediterranean route, but unfortunately it'd be a little hard to sneak _Archangel_ through there."

Kevin nodded to himself. "That certainly makes sense… Well, if nothing else it'll give us a chance to relax. We could probably use it… and I know _I_ can use it. Besides, this also gives _Dominion_ time to rendezvous with us, take a couple of passengers off our hands, drop off Leona, and head off to join _Minerva."_

"Yes," she agreed. "We could all use a chance to rest… before it all begins."

None of them disagreed with the sentiment.

* * *

"Atmospheric reentry complete," _Dominion_'s acting-helmsman announced. "Right on schedule, Commander, and at the target coordinates."

Prometheus Fleet Lieutenant Commander Travis Klein nodded briskly. "Thank you, Lieutenant Wallace. Distance to rendezvous point?"

"Ten kilometers, Sir. We'll reach the designated location in approximately five minutes."

"Excellent. Carry on, then; the sooner we've got our usual Captain and fire-control officer back aboard, the happier I'll be." Klein smiled wryly. "And, if you'll excuse me, Lieutenant, our usual helmswoman. No strike against your skills, but…"

"None taken, Sir," Wallace assured him with an answering smile. "We all know about Commander Steiglitz's abilities; and besides, we all want the old crew back together. Anyway," he added, "it's not like she'd be stealing my post. Even Commander Steiglitz needs a relief at the helm for, oh, at least two shifts a week."

The chuckles that ran through _Dominion_'s Bridge at that remark would've come a lot harder to those present, once upon a time; after all, most of them were ex-Earth Forces personnel, the original crew of the ship. After over two years working with Colonel –then Captain- Walker, and the rest of his band of merry misfits, they'd all gotten used to an air of informality. The crew was, of course, properly disciplined in combat, but under normal circumstances none of them saw any need to knock themselves out with proper protocol all the time. Not anymore.

"Looking forward to seeing your sister, Travis?" a French-accented voice purred.

_Of course,_ Klein reflected darkly, _sometimes that's not such a good thing._

Turning to the black-clad woman who'd spoken, he said, in the tone of a man tired of an old joke, "I keep telling you, Major, I'm _not_ one of those Clynes. My name may be pronounced the same, but it's _spelled_ differently. And I don't _have_ a sister!"

Major Leona Colde, Force Operation X, merely chuckled. "I know, but you have to admit, the similarity is… remarkable."

"And coincidental," he said for –by his count- the fifty-seventh time. "But, since you mention it… yes, I'm looking forward to reaching the rendezvous point."

Leona raised an eyebrow. "Because you'll be glad to turn command back over to Commander Badgiruel… or because you'll be rid of _me?"_

Klein raised an eyebrow. "Do you really want an honest answer to that question, Major?"

Her only response was another chuckle.

_That woman,_ Klein decided yet again, _is impossible. And, unfortunately, just like the Colonel. The sooner she's off this ship, the happier I will be… even if I'm not terrifically happy with our next assignment._

Ordinarily, he had nothing against ZAFT. That hadn't been the case before Kevin Walker stormed the ship –an incident which had nearly resulted in Klein becoming a pile of ash, when a near-miss with a plasma rifle almost incinerated him- but in the years since, he, like his fellows, had come to see the PLANTs in a different light… one untainted by their commanding officer's lingering grudge against ZAFT itself.

All that had changed when word reached Artemis of the ABADDON attack on Onishi Mansion… and the loss of _Concepcion._ When that happened…

"Commander Klein," the radio operator said, breaking into his thoughts, "we've got a signal from the _Archangel._ They'll be surfacing to meet us shortly; at that point, we're to come alongside, and begin transfer of personnel and mobile suits to and from _Archangel."_

Klein nodded. "Understood, Lieutenant. Lieutenant Wallace, make it so."

"Roger that, Commander."

* * *

Two days had passed since Kevin's return to the _Archangel,_ and the ship now lay in the waters south of the Cape of Good Hope. He was fully recovered from the scrambling Arkanian had given him, but he was nonetheless tense… and he knew Murrue and Andy were, as well. They'd been forced to surface for this rendezvous, and they all knew the danger of detection was far greater here that beneath the waves.

Nevertheless, he reflected, standing at the _Archangel_'s airlock –Cagalli, as usual, at his side- he knew it was necessary. Not only would Leona and her mobile suit be of use –considering Foxhound's theft- but getting Flay, Natarle, Carter, Invictus, and Bitter transferred over was important, as well. Flay and Bitter would be sent on to space –Flay to be inducted into the growing FOX unit, and Bitter to be studied and, hopefully, cured- while Invictus, Natarle, and Carter would take up positions on _Dominion_ herself.

_Not that I completely trust Carter even yet,_ Kevin thought, _but his insight may be useful in tracking down Father…_

"You okay, Kevin?" Cagalli asked, gently squeezing his left arm. "You look a little worried."

He shrugged. "Just thinking, tovarisch. This war is so much more complicated than the last, what with all the variables involved…" He trailed off, as the airlock finally opened, and four women stepped through it.

Three of them were clad in gray battle fatigues, and were coming aboard only to assist with the transfers; the fourth, leading them, wore mostly black civilian clothing, similar to Kevin's own. "Major Leona Colde, reporting for duty, Colonel," she announced, coming to attention and saluting.

Kevin returned the salute… though such formality wasn't his style. _As she well knows…_ "Welcome aboard, Griever," he said, naming her by her new codename. "Good to have you back." He looked over her shoulder at the other three pilots. "Long time no see, girls."

In unison, they snapped to attention. "First Lieutenant Asagi Caldwell, codename Alecto, reporting, Colonel!" Asagi said crisply.

"First Lieutenant Juri Wu Nien, codename Tisiphone, reporting for duty, Colonel," Juri said in turn, though with less parade-ground enthusiasm than her teammate.

"First Lieutenant Mayura Labatt, codename Megaira, reporting for duty, Colonel," Mayura announced, rounding out the trio.

Kevin smiled faintly. "The three Furies… appropriate, somehow… Welcome aboard, all of you. Leona, you'd better come with me; the rest of you, report to the Infirmary to escort Carter and Bitter to _Dominion,_ then fly Flay's Impulse over. After that, assist in the transfer of Leona's unit over here."

Asagi saluted again. "Roger that, Colonel!"

"Still hyper," Cagalli noted, as they headed off. "So, they're part of FOX these days, too?"

"Yeah," Kevin acknowledged. "They've only got the neurological package; I don't expect them to get into ground battles very often, if at all. Nonetheless, that augmentation will allow them to pilot their units much better than the average pilot."

"Makes up for our disadvantage in numbers," Leona noted, and turned to Cagalli. "It's good to see you again, My Lady… and in your proper place again."

The younger woman flushed slightly, and glanced away. "Yeah," she said quietly. "Look, Leona… about our last meeting. I'm sorry for… everything, really."

The ex-NGSF soldier shook her head. "Don't worry about it, My Lady. What's done is done; the fact that Kevin here forgave you is good enough for me." She smiled faintly. "Actually, I suppose _we_ should be the ones apologizing now, for poaching those three pilots from the regular Orb military."

Cagalli smiled. "Hardly. I'd rather pilots like them not die because of Yuna and his father signing that treaty… and it sounds like FOX needs all the troops it can get." The three of them were in motion now, walking toward the cafeteria. "So, how were things in space? I've heard that you're using the old Artemis base these days…"

"Right," Leona confirmed. "I understand it took a few months following the war to get the base fully repaired, but since then, research and construction's been proceeding at a breakneck pace." She glanced over at Kevin. "You want a full report?"

He waved a hand. "I probably know most of it already, but it wouldn't hurt for Cagalli to hear the details. It's going to be very pertinent to Orb's defense when we finally retake the country, after all."

"Right, then." Leona cleared her throat, while accessing her new cortical implant's database. "Well, we've currently got two warships under our direct command: _Dominion,_ of course, and _Amaterasu;_ however, _Amaterasu_ is still in the final stages of refitting, cannot be used in terrestrial combat, and, at present has no commanding officer, though we expect the ship to be ready in all respects within two weeks. We also have… or rather, _had_ a single trans-atmospheric cargo ship."

Cagalli winced. "_Concepcion,_ right?"

The older woman nodded. "Exactly. With her loss, we've no heavy-lift capacity between orbit and the surface, and won't until _Atoche_ commissions two months from now. Combat capacity, fortunately, is less limited; our primary concern there is in terms of personnel, as our projects have them stretched rather thin. _Dominion_ and _Amaterasu_ are both at nominal levels, but at present we don't even have the spare people to crew _Prometheus,_ let alone _Icarus."_

"Fortunate they're both still incomplete," Kevin said dryly. "By then, I might be able to get additional manpower from some of my mercenary contacts; not ideal, but about the only recruiting we can do until Prometheus and FOX go public. In any case, I doubt either _Prometheus_ or _Icarus_ will affect the war much. Until we get the Earth-Jupiter hydrogen supply route ironed out, they'll both be of highly limited battle endurance."

"True enough," Leona agreed. "Now, in terms of mobile suits, we still have Duel, Buster, and Strike in liquid nitrogen storage tanks; additionally, we have Nemesis, Max's Morgan, Tolle's Wraith, and four mass-produced Stormhawk units, with a fifth nearing completion now. Three of them are straight copies, with slightly lower combat capacity and minus the ZERO system, while mine lacks the ZERO system and has the new 'melee-DRAGOON' system, with the internal wing storage racks."

Cagalli's eyes had widened perceptibly during the litany. "You really _have_ been busy, Kevin. But… where are you getting the _money_ for all that? That must take a staggering amount of funds, especially with the ships and the 'hydrogen supply route' you're talking about."

"I've sunk over half my personal fortune into the project," Kevin admitted. "Morgenroete was picking up some of the slack before we left –my stock options gave me quite the tidy profit- and the Junk Guild is chipping in with the supply route –since they have their own uses for it- but yeah, it's putting a bit of a crimp in my pocketbook. Nonetheless, it's worth it. I've no use for money for the sake of money; it's nothing but a tool, after all." His jade eyes flashed momentarily. "I'm also funding research into anti-Destroyer weaponry, advanced gene therapy… and a cure for Snake Eater, while at the same time spending money like water in an attempt to locate my father's base."

Leona raised an eyebrow. "If you're on good terms –relatively speaking- with Carter right now, why not just ask _him?"_

"Already tried," Cagalli said with a grimace. "According to him, _he_ doesn't know where it is right now, either. Apparently, he'd been experimenting with adding propulsion systems… and by the time he tried to return, Onishi had already moved it. We're fairly sure he's still in the L4 cluster _somewhere,_ but it'll take months to search all the abandoned colonies there." She sighed. "Which means… we're back at square one. That's why Kevin wants _Dominion_ down here: there's probably a better chance of finding some of Onishi's operations on Earth than of locating his base in space."

Leona nodded to herself. "And locating him is of more immediate priority than almost anything else right now…"

"Pretty much, yeah," Kevin affirmed. "I don't think we need to find him in order to stop Snake Eater –Flay brought back some interesting files that should help a lot- but I still don't know exactly what his goal is, or how he intends to accomplish it, and I find that… unsettling. Also… there's the matter of Delta." His softly-glowing jade eyes darkened. "She brought me down with a single blow just two days ago, and while I don't think our next battle will go that easily for her, it's not a good sign."

He reached out with his left hand then, taking hold of Leona's… and in the seemingly innocent gesture, their neural receptors made contact.

_(That's one reason your presence here is so important,)_ Kevin told her, continuing the conversation without Cagalli's knowledge. _(Because she hacked my brain during that skirmish, made herself invisible to my eyes. It's beginning to look like my fears of an override system were correct… and you know what that means.)_ Grim resolution flooded across the cybernetic linkage. _(Don't forget the other reason I asked you to join FOX, Griever.)_

_(I won't,)_ Leona assured him grimly. _(We've both seen too many terrible things in war to not face the possibility. Nonetheless… do try not to come under its effect in the first place, will you, mon ami? Explaining to Her Highness here why I had to kill you wouldn't be a pleasant experience.)_

_(Neither would dying,)_ he retorted. _(Believe me, I know. And I've no intention of losing to Natalya next time. I just needed to be sure you still remembered your secondary objective.)_

_(I do, Reaper,)_ she said again, using a "shorthand" version of his self-proclaimed title. _(Believe me, I do.)_

_But,_ Leona added to herself, _I have no intention of ever carrying it out. You're not the only one who can find innovative solutions to problems, mon ami…  
_

* * *

Standing on the outer deck of the ZAFT warship _Minerva,_ Athrun Zala looked out at the twilight sea and sighed. _Kevin would love this,_ he thought, recalling his sandy-haired friend. _Coming from an island nation, it's no wonder he loves the sea…_

The _Minerva_ was only a few days out from her destination now, having survived the Earth Forces attack and destroyed an island base… with the help of Kevin Walker and his powerful mobile suit, the Nemesis.

That young pilot was exactly why Athrun was feeling melancholy. He'd appreciated Kevin's assistance during the battle, and even found some amusement in how he'd cheerfully tossed Impulse back toward the ship, then finished the job Shinn Asuka had started… but their conversation after the battle had left Athrun with a dilemma.

_He might not say it outright,_ Athrun thought unhappily, _but Kevin really does think Chairman Durandal ordered that attack on his home, nearly killing Lacus… and he's _convinced_ ZAFT was behind it, one way or another. Will that… put us into conflict again? Will his preconceptions force us to fight each other again?_

He hoped not. Ordinarily, he and Kevin were effectively on equal terms in mobile suits; when Rear Admiral Lewis Halberton's Eighth Fleet had been destroyed, he and Kevin had fought one another, and though Athrun had flown GAT-X303 Aegis, while Kevin piloted the GINN-G-weapon hybrid known as GAT-X401 Punisher, neither had been able to defeat the other. At the time –prior to Punisher's eventual instability forming- their machines had been on effectively even terms, so it really had come down to the skill of the pilots… and in that contest, they had reached a stalemate.

Kevin's new machine, though… Nemesis was built on Stormhawk's frame, which meant that it was effectively of the same generation of Freedom –and thus technically obsolete- but Athrun knew Savior was a far cry from the ZGMF-X-series machines from late in the first war, when nuclear power had been the order of the day. That meant that Nemesis had a certain margin of superiority over Savior's maneuverability… and its unique buster weaponry meant that Kevin could very easily obliterate Savior completely if he made that choice.

And Athrun had never forgotten Kevin's words to him, shortly before the Battle of Orb, when he'd held a rapier to Athrun's throat…

_The blade pulled away, and Kevin sheathed it. "Honor is satisfied. I must warn you, though, that if we meet again in battle, I'll still kill you if necessary, but now I at least have the option of merely disabling you. Though," he added, eyes turning for a moment to jade ice, "if Cagalli is involved, all bets are off. Those who threaten _her,_ I do not hesitate to eliminate."_

Athrun knew all too well that Kevin hadn't been bluffing that day… and that his words still held true. Nothing in the world meant as much to him as Cagalli Yula Athha did; threatening her was generally termed by coroners as "suicide".

Still, it wasn't just his own safety that made Athrun hope their differences wouldn't lead to violence this time. The fact was, they were good friends, and had been since they were six years old; he, Kira, and Kevin had all gone to the same school in Copernicus, on the Moon, and had formed a lasting friendship there… one which, though strained by the war two years previously, nonetheless remained strong.

"You okay, Commander Zala?"

Startled out of his reverie, Athrun turned to see Meyrin Hawke standing behind him, a concerned look on her face. "Uh, yeah," he said, scrambling to collect his thoughts. "Yeah, Meyrin, I'm fine. I was just… thinking."

"About Walker?" she guessed.

He nodded. "Yeah. You… probably know how he reacted during that battle, when he heard my voice on the radio."

Meyrin nodded in turn. "Yeah, you were both using standard radio settings, so we heard it all. I guess he really does still have a grudge against ZAFT, huh?"

Athrun sighed. "Yeah, he does. Given his background, I don't even really blame him; after all that happened to him six years ago, it'd be hard for him _not_ to be suspicious of ZAFT… and he's probably also remembering that the _last_ time I was with ZAFT, we nearly killed each other on several occasions."

Nodding thoughtfully, she turned to watch the sea herself. "The ABADDON project," she mused. "My family knew its name long before almost anyone else did, and we suspected early on, from the tone of Erica's letters, that it was some kind of elite unit. We even realized some kind of experimentation was involved, especially given the young age of the unit's members, but since Erica always seemed happy, we didn't think much of it. Mom and Dad thought she was old enough to make her own decisions, and that was that."

"From what I understand," Athrun said slowly, "I think it _was_ happy… most of the time. Kevin hasn't told me much –I don't think he's told even _Cagalli_ very much about what happened there- but outside of Medical Section, it seems to have been a normal enough place, at least in terms of interpersonal relationships. Outside of Oracle and some of the other staff, the only one who knew what was going on behind the scenes was Kevin himself, and he couldn't remember any of it."

"Hm…" Meyrin glanced over at him, eyes curious. "So… you don't agree with Luna when she and Shinn say what happened there _was_ Walker's fault, at least partly?"

He hesitated, then shook his head. "No," he said firmly. "I… learned firsthand what my father was willing to authorize, so I find it all too easy to accept Kevin's word about what was done to him. And if that _was_ done to him, then I can't place any blame on him for what he did. _Any_ mind would snap under the stress he experienced, and I've heard that his emotional state was precariously balanced from the start."

"I see…" She looked out to sea again, plainly absorbing the information as she prepared to determine her own position on the matter. "So… you've been friends with him for a long time, huh?"

"Yeah," Athrun confirmed. "Since we were kids. Kira, Kevin, and I… we were always a group back then. Kira was the computer genius, I was the mechanical engineer, and Kevin… well, I think he always was the smartest of us, really. He helped me tutor Kira –in those days, he had more trouble with tests than you'd believe a Coordinator _could-_ and he was also the one who… got us into –and out of- the most trouble."

Meyrin looked at him sidelong. "I heard Walker say something about smuggling a ferret into your principal's office…?"

He smiled at the memory. "Yeah, we did. Kevin's idea, in fact, and his plan. The first part of it went flawlessly; even then, he knew his way around a security system. The second part… well, let's just say the faculty knew there weren't many students who could've done it. We got found out, in the end… but Kevin covered his tracks well. Any _real_ evidence would've taken time to find, so he shortstopped the whole thing by taking sole responsibility himself." He turned to her then, expression serious. "And that, Meyrin, is why I believe him when he says he did kill his teammates, but only did so because his mind broke. Because when Kevin Walker does something, he takes responsibility for it, no matter what."

She nodded slowly. "And what had happened to Shinn's family…?"

Athrun shrugged. "You've heard even more about that than I have: Kevin admits the evidence points to him, and accepts that he almost certainly did it… and despite not knowing how it came about, he still does what he can to make up for it. That's part of why he defends _Minerva,_ I think: he couldn't do anything to help your family after ABADDON, and he couldn't help Shinn two years ago –because he was too busy trying to stop anything like that from happening to Orb again- so he does what he can here and now."

"Hm…" Meyrin turned away again, pondering that. "So my sister's killer… is still trying to make up for it…" she murmured, mostly to herself. "Behind the legend… there's just another guy, huh?" She closed her eyes for a moment, and then looked over at Athrun again. "Are _you_ going to try to shoot him down?"

Athrun snorted, smiling faintly. "Do I look crazy, Meyrin? Not only is he one of my best friends –my brother in all but blood- but he's also a very dangerous man. Of the many people who've tried to kill him over the years, only Jack Carter, Dearka Elsman, Yzak Joule, and I are still alive."

She nodded slowly. "Good," she said, and then left, leaving a mildly confused Athrun behind her.

* * *

"_Even now, several months following the incident now known as 'Break The World', not everything has returned to normal. Coastlines and cities struck by pieces of Junius Seven are still struggling to recover, and amidst it all, the Eurasian Federation continues its slow, seemingly inexorable trend toward disunion…"_

Andy Waltfeld stood on Archangel's Bridge and sipped a cup of coffee, shaking his head at the news. "Plenty of talk about how Eurasia's going to pieces," he said in mild disgust, "and almost nothing about war between ZAFT and Earth."

"I know what you mean," Murrue said in agreement, sitting in the captain's chair. "The closest to a war report was that snippet about the base Foxhound smashed, and nobody knows even yet which side did it…"

Andy merely grunted, and turned to watch the water through the forward viewports.

The _Archangel_ now lay in the territorial waters of the Kingdom of Scandinavia, where they expected to be reasonably safe from either side while they planned their next move. _Dominion_ had parted company with them over a week earlier, turning back toward Middle Eastern waters; Natarle and Invictus had been reluctant to part company with their old shipmates, but they felt the need to be about it, especially with the possibility that the man they hunted had control of Foxhound.

In the meantime, Flay had been sent on to space, along with her Impulse unit, while Leona had settled in aboard _Archangel._ She'd brought with her a customized version of the Stormhawk's mass-production type, as well as a small shipment of anti-Destroyer weapons, and a new prosthetic arm for Kevin, who had distrusted his current model since Mongoose and Meerkat's attack.

Time moved on… but the news brought little to tell them where to go next.

"You know," Andy said, after several minutes of silence, "that bit with the Eurasian base is another thing I don't like about all this. When was the last time we heard any _good_ news, anyway? Not since before Armory One, I'm sure."

"Well," Murrue offered with a faint smile, "a white dolphin gave birth to a calf yesterday, not far from here; I'd call that good news."

"Life goes on," Kevin murmured, stepping onto the Bridge with Cagalli on his arm, Kira and Lacus behind them. "Even in the middle of a war… no, _especially_ in the middle of a war, we need to remember that. No matter how bad things get, life always moves on."

"I guess you're right," Andy said thoughtfully, saluting his protégé with his coffee mug. "After all, there's never yet been a war that killed off _every-"_

"Just a moment," Murrue interrupted, watching the screen that still displayed news reports. "Look who it is."

Those on the Bridge turned as one… and several frowned in disapproval as "Lacus" appeared on the screen, performing a remixed version of one of the original's, from the first war. She did so with commendable energy and enthusiasm… which made it even more galling, in some ways.

Cagalli's eyes flashed, watching the imposter's act. "I can't believe she's getting away with that," she muttered darkly. "And what about you guys? Are you really okay with this?"

Andy sighed, looking down into his coffee. "I'd like to do something about it," he acknowledged. "Unfortunately, I don't see what we _can_ do about it right now. We're stuck here, hiding under the ocean from both sides…"

"It doesn't really bother me," Lacus offered. "She _is_ helping calm down the PLANTs, after all; without her, perhaps the situation would be even worse than it already is…"

Kevin shook his head firmly. "I don't care. Lacus, maybe she _is_ helping in that regard, though I personally doubt her effect is that important. Either way, it doesn't matter: the ends don't justify the means, and impersonating you without so much as asking your permission isn't a good thing, in my book. It also very possibly resulting in you nearly dying, in case you've forgotten; if it was Durandal behind that, it was probably an attempt to shut you up."

She sighed. "Perhaps so, Kevin but nonetheless, please don't treat her too harshly, should you meet her. All she's done is speak and sing in my name; she hasn't been part of anything else…"

"Yet," he corrected. "It's true, she hasn't crossed any line yet herself –besides impersonating you in the first place- but if she _does_ step over the line, I'll be entirely happy to step on her myself… or send Leona to do it. Hell she'd be happy to volunteer."

Murrue winced; she wasn't as knowledgeable about the female assassin's past as Kevin was, but she did know Leona had done some…very questionable things in the name of vengeance, before she reformed. _Probably one reason she bears the codename "Griever",_ she reflected. _And even now, I suspect she wouldn't be quite as concerned with a proper surgical kill as Kevin usually is; if he set her loose to track the imposter down… Well, at least she doesn't use torture anymore._

The woman was, however, probably perfectly willing to toss a target out of an airlock without a suit.

"You know," Murrue said now, changing the subject, "it's too bad that we have to be so suspicious of ZAFT. Durandal seems to be a genuine reformer, after all; were it not for the attack on Lacus, I'd actually be inclined to side with ZAFT in this war."

"I won't disagree with you there," Kira said, stepping to her side. "Especially with Athrun joining them but now…"

"Yes," Kevin said quietly. "Now… we're on our own again, just like two years ago."

Admittedly, the existence of Prometheus Fleet and FOX meant that they had greater firepower than during the days of the Four Ships Alliance, but much of it was still under construction… and even were it not, even ZAFT's forces would still dwarf their combat power.

As Kevin had said, they were on their own.

* * *

_Minerva_ had arrived at Mahamul Base on the Arabian Peninsula at last, having fought its way past the Earth Forces' ambush… and even now, Shinn Asuka's mood had not improved. His temper had been uncertain ever since a certain mobile suit had arrived at Carpentaria Base, and the recent battle had only made things worse.

As he walked down one of the ship's corridors, Lunamaria Hawke followed after him in mixed concern and mild irritation. "You know," she said quietly, "if you've got something to say to Commander Zala, you should stop staring at him and just say it. You're not going to resolve anything by keeping quiet."

He shrugged irritably. "He's not the only problem," he muttered. "Though that's part of it; like in that last battle, where he asked _Walker_ for help in 'maintaining proper discipline'."

Luna sighed. "I don't agree with how Commander Zala handled that," she conceded. "Disobeying his orders _was_ over the line, Shinn… but he shouldn't have brought Walker into this. That man hasn't been a member of ZAFT in almost six years; it was none of his business. _But,_" she added, "you're not being very objective, either."

Shinn glanced at her. "And what's _that_ supposed to mean?"

She shrugged. "Anyone can tell you're not happy with Commander Zala being here, Shinn; and I can understand why. After all, he left ZAFT two years ago, going AWOL with a prototype mobile suit –and making him a criminal- and here he is now, back in ZAFT, and a member of FAITH, no less. He goes from wanted son of a dead, disgraced Supreme Council Chairman to a member of an elite unit… and your own direct superior. I think anyone in your position would resent that. But…"

"It's not just that," he said, crimson eyes flashing. "He also claims that traitor Walker as one of his best friends, as _family,_ even. That's not a good indicator of his judgment… or his character."

Luna sighed again. "Shinn, I agree with you about Walker; you know he killed my sister six years ago, and since he won't even tell us what happened, I'm guessing it was brutal. I don't know that I can ever forgive him for that… I don't know if I even _want_ to be able to forgive him for it. But Commander Zala's known him since they were both kids; it'd be hard for him to forget that so easily. With all that in mind, I have to say that you're being childish about this, Shinn. Commander Zala _is_ our superior officer, whether you like it or not, and…"

Shinn rounded on her, glaring. "You're annoying, you know that?" he said angrily. "You really _don't_ understand anything." Still scowling, he stormed off the way they'd come… and passed another face upon whom he bestowed a glare.

Natalya Ivanova Arkanian blinked. "What did _I_ do?" she wondered.

Luna shook her head. "Sorry, Commander Arkanian, but I don't think Shinn likes _anybody_ connected to Walker; since you trained him, I guess that puts you in the same category, as far as Shinn's concerned."

The older woman smiled faintly. "Then I get the worst of both worlds; others connected to Kevin don't like me, either. Last week, I was shot in the head by one of his friends, during a… meeting we were having in Ukraine." She shook her head. "That one _does_ have disciplinary issues, doesn't he?"

"Unfortunately," Luna admitted. "He's always been like that, too, at least as long as _I've_ known him. I'm sometimes surprised he graduated in the first place; he's got the skill for it, but he even talked back to our instructors."

Arkanian snorted. "Yes, I'd call those disciplinary issues; had he been with my old unit, that never would've been tolerated. Hydra or I would've straightened him out in short order, or sent him packing even faster." She lowered her voice. "On another matter… have you heard anything about ZAFT capturing a prototype mobile suit recently?"

Luna blinked, surprised. "Um, no; nobody's said anything like that in my hearing. But… even if we had, wouldn't _you_ be in a better position to know that, Commander?"

Delta shrugged. "Ordinarily, yes, but under the circumstances, I thought Chairman Durandal might've neglected to mention it to me; and since _Minerva_ is an elite ship, I'd thought perhaps those aboard might know."

"Well, I'm afraid I haven't heard anything like that." The violet-haired pilot tilted her head. "May I ask why you're asking, Commander?"

"Just a hunch, Miss Hawke; a bit of mischief north of here that's been puzzling me, that's all. Thanks for your time." Turning away, the former Destroyer instructor walked off, heading for the hangar bay.

Luna scratched her head. "I wonder what _that_ was about?"

* * *

Completely oblivious to the exchange aboard ship, the object of Shinn's ire was at that moment stepping out of _Minerva_'s airlock, accompanied by Captain Talia Gladys and Arthur Trine. Now that they'd arrived at the base, it was time to get down to the business that had brought them all the way from Carpentaria in the first place.

_Good thing we didn't lose anyone on the way here,_ Athrun reflected, as the trio made their way toward the waiting base commander. _From what I hear, this mission is going to be difficult enough as it is; if we'd lost anyone, been shorthanded for this battle…_

The three of them came to a halt before the base commander, and Talia snapped her hand up in salute. "I'm Captain Talia Gladys," she introduced herself, "commanding officer of the _Minerva._ This is Arthur Trine, my executive officer, and Commander Athrun Zala, my mobile suit commander."

Athrun could hear several of Mahamul Base's soldiers inhale audibly at his name, and begin whispering to each other; even the base commander looked surprised, but he kept his composure as he returned the salutes.

"My name is Commander Joachim Ruddle," the man said in turn. "I'm the base commander here at Mahamul." He gestured toward the base's main structure. "If you'll follow me, I believe we have much to discuss, Captain."

"Of course, Commander." Motioning for her shipmates to follow, Talia walked off in Ruddle's wake, Athrun and Trine quickly joining her.

"Whoa," a greencoat said, after they'd passed. "Was that really… Athrun Zala? I'd heard he was dead years ago…"

"The version I heard," another greencoat replied, "was that he went AWOL after receiving the prototype Justice, joined the Clyne Faction, and wound up fighting for the Four Ships Alliance for the last few months of the war. Dunno why he did it, though."

"Maybe he just snapped," a mechanic opined.

A grizzled veteran of a greencoat GuAIZ R pilot snorted. "Then what's he doing back in ZAFT uniform, genius?" he asked rhetorically. "Listen, I was _at_ Second Jachin, and I heard all the scuttlebutt. First off, the poor guy had to fight his own best friends, or so they say; word is he was tight with Freedom's pilot, and it's common knowledge he and the Black Asp are old buddies. After that, you gotta remember that his own father _shot_ him when he asked what was going on with ZAFT policy… and, back then, his fiancé was wanted as a criminal." The veteran snorted again. "Take it from me, kid: Zala ain't like his father. Dunno what he's doing here –last I heard, he hadn't been seen _since_ Second Jachin- but it looks like he's back with us… and believe me, that's a good thing. I saw him fight at Jachin, and trust me, you _don't_ wanna be on his bad side."

* * *

"So," Talia asked, once they were all seated in Mahamul's conference room, "what's the situation, Commander Ruddle? All we had when we set out was a general briefing, and I assume the situation's changed in the time since we left Carpentaria."

Ruddle sighed. "It's changed, yes, but only in the details; the fact is that we're stymied right now, and have been since Operation Spear of Twilight first secured our old bases." He tapped a map on the table they were seated at. "Attacking recklessly would be suicide; you can see that just from the positioning of the defenders. Unfortunately, even being sneaky is going to be difficult here."

Athrun examined the situation map carefully. "I can see that," he said after a moment. "Kind of reminds me of the _Archangel_'s situation, when they were preparing their breakout from Libya, three years ago."

Ruddle nodded in agreement. "Not a bad example, actually; however, Commander Waltfeld's force makeup was a little different from what we're facing here." He sighed. "Truth is, the best solution would be an orbital drop, so that we can get behind enemy lines, but… Well, you should know there's no way the Council would authorize an operation like that."

"Because of Chairman Durandal's declaration that we have no territorial ambitions in this conflict," Talia speculated, nodding to herself.

"Most likely, yes," he agreed. "And, by and large, I think that's the right course; all we want is to not be blown up by extremists, after all. Unfortunately, that's causing us a lot of _problems,_ too. If we let the Earth Forces do as they please now, it'll just make things worse in the long run."

Athrun glanced up from the map. "How so?"

"We're at a stalemate at the moment," Ruddle explained obliquely, planting a finger on the map. "The Earth Forces are currently in the Suez region, and would clearly like to attack both here and at Gibraltar; at the moment, though, they're held back by a tenuous supply line, and indigenous rebel forces with more sympathy for us than them. They have, however, succeeded in seizing a powerplant in the Gulnahan ravine, and they're using it to help supply their Suez frontline."

"I see…" The young pilot bent over the map, tracing its contours with one finger. "Hm… If we can cut off the Alliance logistical train to the Suez base, we should be able to move right in and take it out. Classic siege tactics."

Ruddle nodded. "I agree, and under other circumstances it would be a simple enough operation. Unfortunately, the Earth Alliance isn't stupid; they've thought of it themselves, and have taken precautions. The path to Suez goes right through the Gulnahan ravine… and at the end of that ravine, the Earth Forces have stationed a new, heavy mobile armor, and a Lohengrin positron cannon."

Talia winced. "That's quite the area defense they've got."

"Yeah," Athrun agreed, remembering the previous war. "The _Archangel_ gave us some trouble with theirs, three years ago… How badly have your forces been hurt by it so far?"

"We sent in an attack force of BuCUEs, GAZuOOTs, and GINN OCHERs, supported by land battleships, five days ago," Ruddle replied, with a grimace of his own. "That's how we found out about the ravine's defenses: the attack force was completely wiped out by the positron cannon." He shook his head. "It's obvious we can't get through by conventional means. However… now that _Minerva_ is here, we may stand a better chance."

* * *

A dark shape against the twilit sky, the sleek, winged form of the mobile suit called Leviathan whispered through the air in mobile armor mode, seeking prey. It flew now over Scandinavia, searching for very specific quarry…

"_Any sign of them?"_ the voice said in the pilot's ear.

"Negative," he replied; his voice was no longer the rasp it had been when first piloting the deadly machine. "If they're out here, they're well hidden."

"_Hm… That isn't like him. Hiding when he could be taking a direct approach… he prefers action to plotting."_

"_He's good at subtlety when the need arises,"_ another voice reminded the first. _"The child does not surpass the parent, but it _does_ run in the family. Also, the ship he's aboard supposedly has the Desert Tiger with them, as well; that combination will be a careful one, I'm sure."_

"_Point,"_ the first voice conceded. _"Then perhaps we need to get his attention somehow."_

The pilot, following the exchange, spoke up without waiting to be spoken to again. "You want me to find a suitable target to lure him out? If this machine attacks anything at all, it'll get his attention; I knew him that well."

* * *

Shinn Asuka stood on _Minerva_'s outer deck, gazing out at the setting sun, and brooding. _It's Walker,_ he thought to himself. _Everything always comes back to that bastard… all sides hate him, because of the things he's done, and all sides keep trying to kill him, but nobody's managed it yet. But… _I_ won't fail. It's that mobile suit that gives him his advantage. If I can find a way to counter that, I can bring down even the Black Asp…_

He'd been there a while by the time he heard footsteps coming up behind him, and he grimaced to himself, knowing who it had to be. "Is it all right for you to even be out here right now, Commander?" he said, not bothering to turn his head. "I mean, you must have so much to do…"

Athrun sighed. "You just can't have a conversation without starting an argument, can you?" he asked wearily. Joining Shinn by the railing, he stared out at the evening sky. "Does it really bother you that much that I came back to ZAFT?" He shook his head, and answered his own question. "You must find my reinstatement unreasonable."

Shinn snorted. "Of course it's unreasonable. Coming back after all this time, after all you've done… and you brought Walker into things during that last battle."

Athrun sighed again. "You really hate him for what he did, don't you." It wasn't a question.

The fiery-tempered pilot glanced at him sidelong. "Of course I do," he said, anger smoldering in his heart. "Wouldn't you, if he'd killed _your_ parents?"

The older pilot smiled sadly. "Didn't you know, Shinn? Kevin _did_ kill my father, during Second Jachin… and to answer your question, I _don't_ hate him for it. My father…" He hesitated, remembering the man his father had been… and the one he'd become, after Lenore Zala perished in the Bloody Valentine. "To this day, I don't know how much involvement he truly had in what happened to Kevin. I do know Kevin never forgave him for it, and my father was guilty of negligence at the least, but exactly how culpable he was for ABADDON is something I'll never know." He turned then, and met Shinn's gaze. "I do know this, though: by the time of Second Jachin, my father had to be stopped… and there wasn't time for anything neat and clean like a trial. Had there been one, though, I don't doubt he would've been sentenced to death for his crimes… and as much as I hate to say it, he… would've deserved it."

Shinn snorted bitterly. "Maybe so, but _my_ family didn't deserve what that bastard did. The Athha family put them into a position where they could die, and Walker's own hand finished the job." His fists clenched. "You know, Commander, that I _will_ kill him for that one day. No matter how good he is, one day I'll bring down even the Nemesis."

Athrun simply gazed at him for several moments, thinking. _The sad thing is, in another life he and Kevin might've been friends. They're so alike it's scary… but Shinn lacks the discipline that keeps Kevin in check. The vengeance Shinn contemplates would never even be considered by him, because it was an accident in time of war, not deliberate barbarism like ABADDON, or his mother's death…_

_And what of me? Nicol died at Kevin's hand, and I sought vengeance, even if I did think it was Kira at the time… but when I thought them both dead, I understood my mistake. My mother died in the Bloody Valentine, and I joined ZAFT in hopes of avenging her… but along the way, I realized it wouldn't solve anything. The men who did it are dead now, and punishing the innocent in the stead of the guilty would be just as wrong as the Bloody Valentine itself…_

"Shinn," he said finally, "there's something you need to understand. We've all lost people close to us in these wars. Far too many civilians have lost loved ones to 'collateral damage', as well, and those who mourned and felt weak have always sought the power to make a difference. I did, after my mother died, and so did the pilot of the Freedom when he realized neutrality was no longer an option. But… we both realized something." He met the younger pilot's eyes squarely. "When we used that power, it only made others do the same thing we did. As we cried, so did they… and in the end, all it brought us was to the brink of killing each other."

Shinn scowled at him. "So what are you trying to say, 'Commander'?"

"That if you forget the responsibility that comes with that power, you'll just be a reckless Destroyer," Athrun said bluntly, emphasizing the last word to remind Shinn of the group meant for just that. "Someone who destroys indiscriminately, forgetting the human cost behind it all. If you _do_ remember, you'll be an excellent pilot, worthy of the red uniform you wear. But if you forget… you'll just be an idiot, and that idiocy will lead inevitably to your own destruction."

* * *

Kevin entered _Archangel_'s Bridge at a brisk walk, having been summoned by an urgent PA message.

"What's going on?" he asked without preamble.

She sighed. _I should've known he'd say that. He still has no fear of death at all…_ "At least wait until we can send Kira up with you," she requested.

Kevin shook his head. "Sorry, but we don't have time for that. Kira's sound asleep; it'll take him at least a few minutes to be ready for combat. Send him up when you can, but I'll be up there first. There's no time to waste."

He ducked into the elevator then, and Murrue sighed again. "That kind of 'gung-ho' attitude is going to get him killed one day," she murmured worriedly.

"It already has," Andy pointed out quietly. "But he's right: the sooner someone's keeping that thing occupied, the better." He met her gaze, concerned himself but feeling a certain confidence in his protégé. "All we can do for him is pray, Murrue. Until we can get Freedom out there, Racher's the only one who can handle it."

"I guess you're right…" _But he'd better be careful. Cagalli's going to be angry enough when she finds out he launched without waking her up; if he gets hurt in the process…  
_

* * *

Sensing something amiss, Leviathan's pilot jerked to port just as a pair of powerful azure bolts flashed right at him. "I don't know who you are," Kevin Walker said coldly, as Nemesis winged its way across the sky in mobile armor mode, "but you should know that's stolen property you've got there… and I intend to retrieve it." Nearing his captured unit, he converted to mobile suit mode, and raised his rifles. "Surrender… or die."

Leviathan's pilot grinned. "A challenge at last! I was beginning to think you weren't going to show up… Kevin." He reversed thrust, bringing his own unit to a halt in the air, and transitioned smoothly to mobile suit mode.

Kevin frowned. "That voice… sounds familiar…" he murmured. "Who are you?"

The enemy pilot laughed. "Don't tell me… you've forgotten me, old 'friend'. It's been six years since we met as allies… but only three since you killed me." His laughter cut off abruptly. "Only three years since you committed fratricide."

In his own cockpit, Kevin went rigid with bone-deep shock. _No… no, it's not possible. I watched him die, I felt him die, I _made_ him die!_ Memories flashed through his mind, of gunfire, screams, and explosions, as he raided a Banadiya Blue Cosmos safehouse, killing the man who'd caused his mother's death…

Of a sandy-haired, jade-eyed young man holding Cagalli hostage, before they fought, before Kevin's claws ripped out his heart… before the flaming destruction of the house consumed him.

"It… it can't be…" Kevin whispered, face bone white. "…Mike…?"

In response, a communications window appeared in his mental Heads-Up Display… and the sunken, slightly scorched, but otherwise recognizable features of Michael Carnehan, codename Kraken, looked back at him.

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

In the wake of the most emphatic defeat of his career, Kevin has returned to the _Archangel_ to rest… and has been rejoined by Leona Colde, now set to take her place as his wingman. Meanwhile, _Minerva_ has arrived in the Arabian Peninsula, and preparations are underway for an attack on the Earth Forces.

Now, though, an additional complication has confronted Kevin: he is confronted by his own greatest creation… and by the specter of his own teammate, one-time enemy… and brother.

Well, I think this is up a little faster than I've been managing lately; if not, I expect some things in it were at least worth waiting for. Oh, and before anyone tells me there's no way Mike Carnehan can be alive, let's just say… he isn't. Not in the way you're thinking. The full explanation will be in the next chapter, which probably won't be till after I put up Chapter 3 of Cry of the Falcon.

In the meantime, let me know what you think. –Solid Shark


	19. Chapter 19: Sword Dancer

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk**

* * *

"_It's interesting how often myths and stories have a grain –or more than a grain- of truth in them, in the end. My comrade, commanding officer, and genetic kin Kevin Walker, and his own brethren, were known as Destroyers, their codenames naming them as monsters out of myth; the name my comrades and I in the Next-Generation Special Forces took on came from a story, and I, as the last remaining Demon of Razgriz, became a demon in truth, after my unit fell._

"_Yet sometimes, demons have their place on the battlefield, and perhaps one day I, too, will change, as did the Razgriz…_

"'_Amidst the eternal waves of time,_

"'_From a ripple of change shall the storm rise_

"'_Out of the abyss gaze the eyes of a demon_

"'_Behold the Razgriz, its wings of black sheath…'"_

Contribution made by Force Operation X Major Leona Colde, in Chapter 13 of _The Tragic Spiral of War_, by Colonel Kevin Walker

* * *

Colonel Kevin Ivanovich Walker, Force Operation X, could not believe the data streaming into his brain through his neural connections to Nemesis. It simply wasn't possible for the face in his communications display to be real. It just _couldn't_ be!

The face that looked back at him was… himself, but different. Had it been one of his ZAFT-made, or even Carter-made, clones, the jade eyes would've shared the glowing look of his own… but the manner in which the enemy pilot had addressed him, along with the dull eyes, told him exactly who it was.

Michael Carnehan, codename Kraken… one of the original twelve Destroyers, and a man Kevin had believed dead since personally executing him in Banadiya, in self-defense and in retaliation for the threat he'd posed to Cagalli.

The man who was also Kevin's clone brother, from the days of Project Guardian itself. The one whose death had made Kevin live up to his own secondary codename, Cain.

Now he was piloting Kevin's own stolen mobile suit.

"How…" Kevin whispered, face pale. "How… is this possible? Mike… you were _dead!"_

"True," Carnehan agreed, smiling thinly, looking remarkably lively for a dead man. "But my body was recovered by certain… interested parties, after you and your girlfriend killed me. For two long years, I remained in cryogenic storage, just a corpse… but then, as chance would have it, my current masters captured this mobile suit, which, it turned out, only one of us could fly properly… and only someone with DNA effectively identical to yours could _really_ make it work."

Nemesis' hand twitched, nearly bringing the twin buster rifle to bear. "That doesn't explain how the devil you're talking to me, Mike!" Kevin's hands would've clenched hard, had the nerve impulses not been directed into Nemesis instead. "You should've been able to rest in peace, with-"

"With Erica?" Carnehan snorted. "Not yet, Hydra. No, not yet… One thing about our augmentation you apparently never thought about, old friend: our bodies can be reanimated by activating the cybernetic linkages throughout our structures; with some tissue repairs by my masters, I was a corpse, but one that could move… and it seems that, when I died, my personality dispersed into my cybernetic neural network, becoming lost as data fragments. When they came back together… well, here I am."

Kevin swallowed hard. "And just what is it you're doing here, Mike?" he whispered. "Why _have_ you come back? Who sent you?"

"I'm piloting ZGMF-X15A/M Leviathan," Kraken replied, his smile now showing teeth. "That should answer your second question neatly enough. And your first… Isn't it obvious? Elements within ZAFT want you dead, Hydra… and I want the revenge my death deprived me of."

His near-duplicate closed his eyes. "This is wrong," he whispered, more to himself than to his "brother". "You really are insane… something broke you, just as I snapped at ABADDON…"

"Does it really matter?" Carnehan said contemptuously. "What matters is… you're not getting out of this alive." Leviathan raised its own twin buster rifle, and its pilot's mouth twisted into a challenging grin. "I hope you give me a good fight, Kevin… but you can't hope to survive Leviathan for long." He sent a single command into Leviathan's computers.

Kevin, realizing what was happening an instant before his brother finished speaking, reestablished combat connection with his machine with great haste. _Twin buster rifle armed, set to Level Three, fire!_ he thought, faster than his opponent could get out the same command.

Twin columns of azure light erupted from Nemesis and Leviathan, along identical firing arcs.

* * *

Though _Archangel_ was still submerged, the terrible flash of light was perfectly visible from the Bridge, penetrating the layers of water with ease as titanic forces above met and annihilated each other in actinic fury.

"What's happening up there?" Murrue Ramius demanded, blinking in an attempt to clear her vision after the flash. "What was that light?"

"Positron collision, Ma'am," Miriallia Haw said worriedly, from CIC. "I think they just fired maximum power beams at each other; the resulting collision produced a highly… energetic reaction."

"And the machines themselves?" Murrue couldn't keep the worry out of her voice; she'd been nervous enough when her "oath brother" insisted on launching without waiting for Kira. With the sort of firepower he and Foxhound were obviously throwing at each other…

"Intact," Mir assured her. "At least, Nemesis is; we're still receiving telemetry via quantum communications. But…"

"Unable to determine Foxhound's status," Jackie Tonomura finished for her. "That blast scrambled our sensors pretty badly, Captain."

Murrue bit her lip. _Be careful, Kevin… If it's too strong for you, then please, just fall back; we can fight it again another time…_

Her worried reverie was interrupted by her right-hand intercom panel lighting up, showing Kira's face; he was already in a flightsuit, looking tense. _"What's going on?"_ he asked, tension just as obvious in his voice. _"I got word I should prepare to launch, but nobody's told me what's happening yet."_

"About the worst thing that could be right now, Kira," she informed him. "A few minutes ago, we detected the Foxhound; and Kevin insisted on launching himself." She shook her head, worried. "I don't know exactly what's happening out there right now, but they've already attempted to wipe each other out with positron fire…"

Kira closed his eyes. _"This is bad… All right, Murrue, I'm heading out immediately. If Kevin can't deal with it, I might be able to."_

"_I'm heading out, as well,"_ Leona Colde interjected, appearing on Murrue's left intercom screen. _"Mon ami might've forgotten why he bothered to recruit me in the first place, but _I_ haven't… and my particular variant of Stormhawk has a trick Foxhound's pilot may not expect."_

Murrue nodded, feeling a trace of relief. "Thank you, both of you. Leaving aside my concern for Kevin, I have a feeling that Foxhound wouldn't be content with just killing him; it might come after _us,_ as well."

"_Yeah,"_ Kira agreed grimly. _"It probably would, at that… Look, I'd better hurry. Oh, and Murrue… if Cagalli tries to launch, please, don't let her."_

She nodded again. "Don't worry, I understand."

Murrue understood very well, in fact. Not only was there the fact that Kevin would be most unhappy if she were put into danger like that, but it would also be foolhardy to launch the Strike Rouge into that kind of situation. Even now, it would stand up to mass-production mobile suits… but if Kevin Walker and Nemesis couldn't fight Foxhound on even terms, there was no way on earth Strike Rouge would survive more than a few moments against it… if that.

* * *

Even with his onboard computer systems, it took Kevin several moments to recover from the massive concussion of the blast. When the two antimatter streams met, the resulting explosion had blown both mobile suits away, sending them into veritable tailspins, completely out of control.

When Kevin finally recovered, he found himself falling headfirst toward the ground, at an alarming rate; knowing that smashing into the ground at such speed would do bad things even to him, he quickly flipped Nemesis over, activated all its verniers, and decelerated at a punishing rate, before finally regaining upward momentum… and seeing his enemy again.

Leviathan had been buffeted just as much by the terrible blast, but it had certain advantages Nemesis lacked… and Michael Carnehan was no longer concerned with mortal limitations. Recovering even faster than Kevin, he'd converted Leviathan into GERWALK mode, and now hovered five kilometers up, waiting for Nemesis to rejoin him.

"Well," Kraken observed, "I guess Nemesis isn't just a paper tiger after all… not that you should expect it to help you, Hydra." He smirked. "You just gonna sit there, or are you going to come and finish this?"

"We shouldn't be doing this," Kevin retorted, putting away his buster rifle and igniting a blade of frozen lightning. "We should never have had to fight in the first place, Kraken; we were friends, once… and even if it had to end that way, you should've at least rested peacefully."

Carnehan snorted. "I'll rest peacefully when we're _both_ in our graves, Kevin. Now… have at you!" Reconverting completely to mobile suit mode, Leviathan ignited the azure blade on its right wrist, and blazed across the sky to meet Nemesis.

"Let's dance!" Kevin snapped his own blade up just in time, catching Leviathan's just in front of his face in a shower of blue sparks. _Uh oh. Foxhound's even faster than I expected… is it because a corpse doesn't care about G-limits, or did my people simply outdo themselves this time? Not that it matters; either way, I'm in trouble…_

Summoning more power from Nemesis' reactor, he managed to force Leviathan away, and unleashed a counterattack, lunging forward in an attempt to impale Leviathan's cockpit. He wanted his purloined machine back intact, and he _didn't_ want to have to kill his brother again… but it was becoming very, very clear that if he showed sentimentality, he would die.

Maybe permanently, this time.

Carnehan snorted, lashing out with surprising speed to parry the blow. "Too slow, Hydra," he commented, unleashing a flurry of slashes with his wrist blade. "For the 'fastest man alive', you're being slower than I remember…"

_Solkin syn!_ Kevin snapped Nemesis' left arm up, activating the wrist-mounted beam shield, and managed to fend off the with that and a series of lightning-quick parries of his own, but he knew it wasn't looking good. _Next time, I include an autodestruct feature that activates on _any_ attempt at unauthorized access…_

Leviathan paused for an instant, as Carnehan evaluated the performance differential between the two machines, and Kevin seized the moment, converting Nemesis to mobile armor mode and streaking higher into the sky to gain some breathing room. "Okay," he whispered to himself, "at close range, he'll turn me into tomato paste before I can blink. At long range, though, all I need is one shot…"

Accelerating straight up, he broke the sound barrier… and kept on going.

* * *

Screaming all the way up to the mesosphere, Nemesis sought to gain distance from its enemy… yet Kevin was far from surprised when, turning his attention to rearward optical sensors, he saw Leviathan easily racing up after him. They were both flying at better than Mach Six, and still accelerating… and Mike Carnehan was gaining on him.

"You can't outrun me, Kevin," Carnehan mocked. "No matter the altitude, Leviathan still outperforms your obsolete unit. Why don't you turn and fight like a man? Don't tell me the infamous fearlessness of the Black Asp has deserted you."

_Well,_ Kevin thought sardonically, _that pretty well confirms who he's working for, when you put that together with the new model number. Only ZAFT calls me that…_

"Didn't plan on outrunning you," he said aloud. "I was just getting… a little breathing space." Cutting his thrusters, he flipped Nemesis over, transformed back into mobile suit mode, and raised his twin buster rifle. "Because I didn't fancy destroying myself along with you!" Crosshairs appeared in his mental vision, and he sent the firing command.

Carnehan reacted with lightning reflexes, vectoring his thrust to shove Leviathan out of the azure beam's path; instead of blasting the stolen machine to pieces, the level two blast gouged a trench in the ground, far below… and Leviathan, undeterred, returned to mobile suit mode as it neared Nemesis' altitude.

_This is bad,_ Kevin thought, as his brother's machine rose to meet him. _It's just like I told Athrun… I can't outrun it, and I may not even be able to outfight it… time for Plan B._ He separated his rifle into two, and let them fall from his hands, before yanking out both beam sabers and bringing the azure blades to life. Then, taking a deep breath, he dropped into a swan dive, falling to intercept Leviathan.

Carnehan was actually taken off-guard by the unexpected maneuver, and only just managed to activate his own lightning-like blades before Nemesis' outstretched arms moved inward, slashing at Leviathan's torso in a vicious cross… but delayed though his reaction might've been, Kraken was still able to counter effectively.

His right wrist-blade snapped up, and managed to sweep across the arc of both of Nemesis' blades, deflecting them just enough to force them to pass by harmlessly… while his left blade flicked out toward Nemesis' head.

Nemesis kept on dropping right past Leviathan, but it hadn't escaped unscathed this time. Carnehan's strike hadn't been catastrophic, but Kevin could tell from the sudden static on some of his communications lines that his long-range radio antenna had just been destroyed. _Good thing I don't need to talk to anyone more than a couple klicks away right now,_ he thought laconically, trying to ignore the uneasy feeling that was starting to creep up on him. _Not a good sign… but if the rest of this maneuver works…_

Transitioning to mobile armor mode mid-fall, Nemesis dropped neatly between its buster rifles, and twitched slightly from left to right, just enough to lock the weapons onto their mobile armor hardpoints. Then he eased out of the ninety-degree fall… but kept descending, trying to reach a lower altitude. Part of that was to be within easier reach of any reinforcements; partly, though, Kevin had to admit a crash would be more survivable from something less than fifty kilometers up.

"You're not getting away, Hydra!" Kraken called, following him into the dive. Leviathan had entered GERWALK mode for the drop… and now he began firing bursts of azure light down at his target.

_Solkin syn!_ Kevin rolled hard to his right, and through his electromagnetic –and thermal- sensors, he literally _felt_ the intense plasma bolt scorch just past his right wing… as well as the three that followed, which he narrowly avoided by pulling out of the dive completely, leveling off at two thousand meters. _He's good… too good._

Carnehan's mouth drew back in a savage smile, and he converted to mobile suit mode once again, preparing to fire one last shot. "You're not getting away from _this_ one, Hydra," he whispered. "There'll be no room at all for you to dodge…" Waiting for the crosshairs to settle on the rolling Nemesis, Leviathan's finger tightened on the trigger.

And two red-orange plasma bolts, two rail cannon slugs, and an emerald beam rifle dart nearly blotted him out forever.

"What the-! Who-?" Canceling his forward momentum with bone-rattling force, Kraken hurriedly glanced around, looking for the new threat… and his mouth tightened as he saw ZGMF-X10A Freedom rising up to meet him.

"Get away from him!" Kira shouted, firing another salvo at Leviathan. "Now!"

Kevin's gaze snapped around, hearing his friend's voice. "No, Kira!" he said sharply, switching back to mobile suit mode. "Don't get near us! He's too strong!"

"Stop it, Kevin!" Kira shot back. "I'm not gonna just let him kill you. _You_ should be the one to fall back, before he does more than knock out your antenna!" Grunting, he snapped off another shot from his beam rifle, which Leviathan narrowly fielded with a hurriedly-activated beam shield.

"Kira," the super-soldier said, as calmly as he could, "you don't understand what you're fighting. That thing is just as bad as my predictions, which means-"

"Quiet, 'Colonel'," another voice interrupted irately. "Kira's right; and next time, why don't you think about why you recruited me in the first place before you head off by yourself on a suicide run?"

His eyes widened… and closed momentarily in chagrin, as he saw the other machine that was entering the fray. Steel-gray, with the emblem of the so-called "Demons of Razgriz" on its torso, it looked remarkably like Nemesis' original form… which, of course, it was essentially a downgraded copy of.

Which also happened to be piloted by one Major Leona Colde, codename Griever, whom Kevin had recruited into FOX for essentially this very purpose.

Still… "Look, you two," Kevin began again, "that thing is beyond even Nemesis; and since it's piloted by-"

His evasive maneuvers took him right into the path of an azure bolt before he could finish the sentence.

Hit by a bolt of power it was never intended to resist, Nemesis' wings ripped away, trailing sparks… and its thrusters malfunctioned under the intense heat, rocketing him toward the ground at high velocity.

"Kevin!" Kira called, instinctively reaching out for his friend's falling mobile suit. "Kevin, are you all right? I'm coming-"

(_Forget it!_) Kevin said sharply across their link (his communications systems having suffered fatal damage in the attack). (_Either run away, or convince Mike he doesn't want to be here. You've got no time to worry about me, understand?_)

(_I…_) Kira stared at the descending Nemesis, knowing all too well how hard it was going to impact on the ground… and then nodded sharply. (_All right,_) he said firmly. (_But you'd better survive this, or Cagalli will never forgive you!_)

(_I won't forgive me, either,_) Kevin said dryly, and activated his quantum link with Leona's implants. (_Griever, there's not a thing you can do for me right now, except try to make sure Kira's brilliant stunt doesn't get him killed. You understand?_)

(_Understood, Reaper,_) Leona said firmly (and more confidently than Kevin himself). (_We'll make him regret this one, mon ami._)

As the silent conversations went on, Carnehan was making a report of his own. "Primary target disabled, Sir," he transmitted. "Crash imminent, but probably not fatal; what are my orders?"

"_Are you alone?"_ the voice on the other end said immediately.

He grimaced. "Unfortunately, no. Hydra may've been disabled, but Freedom and what appears to be a variant of the original Stormhawk design are present."

"_Disable Freedom,"_ the voice directed. _"I'm not sure I want him dead yet. As for the Stormhawk variant… eliminate it. Walker's subordinates are unlikely to be suborned, knowing the sort he associates with, and anyone to whom he'd assign such a unit is likely to be extremely dangerous. Once you've removed both from the tactical situation, finish what's left of Nemesis."_

"Understood. Proceeding with-"

A sword slashed into Leviathan's back, the impact interrupting powerful to its thrusters for several seconds.

Instinctively converting to full mobile armor mode, allowing him to glide till power could be reestablished, Carnehan glanced around, trying to find what had hit him. When he did, his teeth bared in a snarl, as he understood just how crafty his brother's Project Prometheus Unchained had gotten in the last two years.

Leona Colde's Stormhawk hovered above him, a broadsword with a peculiar hilt in one hand… and the wings, which on the original had contained a pair of plasma cannons, had split open, revealing three compartments each. One of them was empty… but the other five showed the hilts of more blades, a fact which connected ominously with the odd hilt of her current weapon.

"Allow me to introduce you to Prometheus' latest melee invention, Kraken," Leona said calmly, staring right at the captured unit. "It's called the Illumina. Six different blades, each with their own purpose… and while they might not individually be enough to damage a machine equipped with phase-shift armor, I assure you that's been taken into account." She smiled; it was the expression of a hunter, not an expression of amusement. "You don't want to see Illumina's combined form, believe me."

Carnehan hesitated, but as power returned to his thrusters, he smiled mockingly. "Nice try, Colde, but you don't scare me with that thing. And even if you could hurt me… that presupposes you could _catch_ me."

"Maybe she couldn't, but _I_ can."

Carnehan blinked, then rolled right and pulled away in a blink of an eye, just ahead of the multi-weapon barrage that would've fried him. _Hm… Two on one. This could actually be tricky._ "You're only delaying the inevitable," he transmitted. "Not even the two of you can stop Kevin Walker's masterpiece."

"I don't believe that," Kira retorted. "Anything can be stopped, even that; Nemesis just wasn't equipped to do it." His eyes, previously normal enough, had changed, turning to the wide, clear look of someone under the influence of the SEED factor. "Between the two of us, your only option is to surrender, Carnehan."

"We'll see about _that,"_ Kraken said contemptuously, and opened fire.

* * *

Cagalli burst onto _Archangel_'s Bridge, having been startled awake by the explosions occurring above, and immediately bestowed a glare on the crew at large. "What's going on?" she demanded. "Are we under attack?" _And where,_ she added to herself, _is_ _Kevin? He should've been on his way immediately…_

Murrue swiveled in her chair to face her. "We don't seem to be under attack ourselves, actually," she informed the feisty princess. "Not yet, anyway. But…"

"But it seems Foxhound has reappeared," Andy finished for her, turning in his seat. "And this time, Racher seems to be its target. Him, specifically."

Cagalli felt a ball of ice forming in her gut. "So Kevin… is out there already?" she said slowly. "He's already fighting it?"

Murrue sighed. "Unfortunately, yes. I tried to convince him not to go, but he was pretty insistent, and you know how stubborn he can be. His current status is… unknown, because of the scrambling effects of the positron beams they fired at each other, but he does still seem to be in the fight, and both Kira and Leona have joined him."

"Then I'm heading out, too!" Cagalli declared, turning back to the elevator. "Strike Rouge is ready, isn't it? Then I'm going to-"

"No," Andy interrupted sharply. "No, I'm afraid that's not a good idea."

She spun to face him, furious. "Listen, Waltfeld, that's _Kevin_ out there, and after all the times he's almost gotten himself killed –like his battle with Delta the other day- I'm not going to let him fight all alone!"

Murrue shook her head. "No, Cagalli. Andy's right: you're an excellent pilot, but Kevin has doubts about even Nemesis' ability to fight on equal terms with Foxhound. Taking the Strike Rouge against it would very likely be suicide, and he'd never forgive me if I let you do that."

"But-!" Cagalli bit her lip. _This isn't right,_ she thought bitterly. _Everything was finally going our way again, after the wedding was interrupted… Why are people trying so hard to kill Kevin now?_ "Please, Murrue, I have to…"

"I'm sorry," the older woman said gently. "But if those three can't handle it by themselves, there isn't much Strike Rouge could add to it… and I think they'll fight better knowing you're safe aboard _Archangel."_

Cagalli looked away, unwilling to admit how frightened she really was for Kevin… or that, deep down, she knew they were right not to let her launch. _But still…_

"Status change!" Mir called. "It's… Captain, Nemesis is hit, and falling out of the engagement area!"

* * *

Falling from a great height in an uncontrolled fashion wasn't an unfamiliar experience for Kevin Walker. It had been five years, perhaps, but it had happened before… and he didn't expect this time to be much more pleasant than the last.

He just hoped that it didn't end with half his face being blown off this time.

_At least I managed to shut off the thrusters before they could ram me down into the bedrock,_ he thought, curiously detached.

Nemesis crashed to earth, and Kevin saw no more of the battle.

Carnehan hardly noticed the fall of his prey; he was more concerned with Freedom, which had proven to be a far trickier target than he'd anticipated. _I'm beginning to wish I hadn't been dead for the latter half of the war,_ the resurrected Destroyer thought, briefly energizing his shield to intercept a pair of red-orange plasma bolts, before boosting for the sky. _It's almost like he's using a ZERO system… I guess he didn't get his reputation for nothing._

Gritting his teeth, Kira soared up after him, firing his beam rifle. "You're not getting away, Carnehan," he called. "Not after what you did to Kevin… and not when you could still be a danger to my other friends."

Kraken snorted. "As if Freedom's pilot would ever actually kill me," he said derisively, stashing his buster rifles and drawing one of his beam revolvers. "It's well known that Freedom never killed; I don't expect you to change that now."

"I can kill when I have to," Kira said unflinchingly, spattering an azure dart with his shield. "I had no choice but to finish Le Creuset, three years ago… and when your people attacked our home, and hurt Lacus, I did what I had to do, so don't think I won't if I have to. But I don't intend to kill you, Carnehan… because I _don't_ need to."

"Oh? And what makes you say that?" Leviathan holstered its revolver, activated a beam saber… and instantly had the weapon intercepted by a physical blade.

"_I_ do," Leona said conversationally. "And did I mention Illumina's component blades all have anti-beam coating?"

"Just one blade still isn't going to…" Carnehan trailed off then, as he realized he was, in fact, _surrounded_ by the other five Illumina blades, held aloft by thrusters in their hilts. "Okay, I admit it: you've managed to confuse me, Colde. Don't expect it to help you, though; a few hovering blades aren't going to-"

The five blades whirled around him, then returned to Leona's machine… which recovered them one by one, and snapped them into the main blade's hilt. "It's called a 'melee DRAGOON' system," she informed him. "And this is only one of its interesting features." She smiled coldly. "If you ever see the other, you'll only see it once."

_Hm…_ "All this proves is that you have some interesting tricks," he said contemptuously. "If you've got anything actually worth something, I suggest you use it now… because playtime is over. I'm taking the gloves off." _Because I've had it with playing tag. You're getting in the way… and I have full authorization to destroy you._

Snake-quick, Leviathan lifted its twin buster rifle, and the muzzle started to glow…

And a streak of scarlet fired slashed the twin barrels in half, causing the rest of the weapon to blow itself apart in a violent short-circuit.

"I'm the one who's done playing," Kira said coldly, Freedom rising to Leviathan's altitude, an active beam saber in its right hand. "You nearly killed Kevin, and you people already tried to kill Lacus. I'm not letting _you_ stop me."

"Hm…" Carnehan took a moment to consult Leviathan's diagnostics, and winced as he found that the explosion of his primary weapon had damaged the mechanisms of his machine's hands. _Without repairs, I'm down to sabers and autocannon…_

He swiftly passed the information on to higher authority, but he already knew what his new orders would be. _"All right, Kraken,"_ the voice said immediately. _"Pull back. Finish it another day."_

"Understood." He turned his attention back to the two _Archangel_-based machines, both of which were preparing to attack him again. "Sorry to cut things short, but it seems I've made a slight miscalculation, so I'll have to bid you adieu… for now." The Destroyer smiled thinly. "Don't worry, though. I'm sure we'll meet again soon enough…"

Converting to mobile armor mode, Leviathan pointed straight at the sky, and fired its thrusters.

"Come back here, you coward!" Leona snarled, seeing him escape at speeds even Nemesis couldn't have matched. "I'll-"

"Let him go, Leona," Kira interrupted quietly. "We can't catch him now anyway… and Kevin needs our help." He gestured toward the small trench on the ground where Nemesis had impacted. "I know he survived it –I can still feel him- but I don't know what kind of shape he's in. Besides, he'll want us to get Nemesis back to the ship as soon as possible; it's gonna take a while to fix, even with nanotechnology."

Leona sighed. "Right. It galls me to let someone like that go, but… you're right. Besides, I want more information on what exactly is going on before I take _him_ on again. I thought Carnehan was dead… and before now, I would've sworn no enemy alive could pose that much threat to Reaper in a mobile suit." She glanced at Freedom. "Good thing you were around, mon ami."

"Yeah…"

Together, the two of them descended toward the ravaged mobile suit… and inwardly, both of them were preparing for the monumental rant Cagalli was likely to deliver when they returned to the _Archangel.  
_

* * *

Several hundred kilometers away, the ZAFT warship _Minerva,_ joined by the land battleships _Desmond_ and _Bagley_, made her way across the desert through the Gulnahan ravine. Her resupply complete, she had finally been able to move out, and now journeyed toward her target.

On her Bridge, Captain Talia Gladys activated her intercom. "All hands on alert," she ordered. "We're nearing enemy territory now. All pilots, report to the briefing room for detailed information on the mission." She glanced over at Bart Heim. "Any sign of… unexpected visitors, Bart?"

Heim shook his head. "Nothing so far, Ma'am."

Standing near the starboard bulkhead, Natalya Ivanova Arkanian shook her head with a quiet chuckle. "He won't be coming, Captain, if that's what you're thinking."

"It did cross my mind," Talia admitted. "Captain –or I guess it's Colonel, these days- Walker does seem to be interested in the survival of this ship, though I'm not sure exactly why. It wouldn't have surprised me at all if he'd decided to aid us here, as well."

Delta shrugged. "It's probably easy enough to understand why he'd do it in the first place; the Hawke sisters are aboard, after all. Kevin is… still unable to forget the ABADDON incident, even after the better part of six years; my guess is that he's trying his best to protect the surviving few who suffered because of the Project… or more precisely, because of how he ended it."

Talia tilted her head. "Then why wouldn't he intervene here, as well?"

The older woman sighed. "Because of a very peculiar incident I learned of earlier today. It appears that he ran into something far to the north that even he couldn't handle, and was shot down; from the Destroyer linkages, I know he's still alive, but he also seems to be unconscious… and if I had to guess, his machine is also in rough shape. Probably worse than his body, in fact."

The captain blinked. "After his performance in our encounters with him, I didn't realize any existing machine was capable of that, without him making a tremendous miscalculation. You're sure of this information?"

Delta shrugged. "I didn't receive it directly; Chairman Durandal informed me. He said it came from a very reliable intelligence source, though, so I presume it to be correct. As for what it was, though…" She sighed again. "There are a number of things going on now that even I have little knowledge of. Hydra's father has reentered the stage for the first time in five years, survivors of the original ABADDON unit are surfacing… and traces of Destroyer technology are beginning to appear in unexpected places. My own belief is that Kevin was led into a trap by his own purloined mobile suit, but even that is just conjecture at this point."

Talia thought about that for several moments. _I don't like the thought of someone that can swat Nemesis like a fly being out there; I've no doubt that Nemesis itself could've simply destroyed us on sight had Colonel Walker so chosen, so the idea of something that could so casually bring him down… But if it was trap meant for _him,_ that means it's not necessarily a direct threat to _us._ I hope not, anyway…_

Finally, she turned to the other woman. "I do hope you're investigating the situation," she said quietly. "If it's Onishi…"

Arkanian nodded. "I know. He may be content with eliminating his own son, and taking over Orb, but then again he might not be. Believe me, my unit and I are on guard against the possibility."

* * *

As Lunamaria Hawke accompanied Shinn Asuka into the briefing room, she noted the temperamental pilot seemed to be in a better mood than usual. _Guess he heard about what happened to Walker, too,_ she thought, feeling more than a trace of ignoble satisfaction herself. _At least _that_ lunatic won't be involved this time…_

"So," Shinn said, glancing at Rey, who had arrived ahead of them, "we're going to be working with a local resistance group this time?"

"That's right," Arthur Trine confirmed, stepping in with Athrun and a young girl in tow. "This is our liaison with them, Conille Almeta. She's providing much of the information you'll be receiving in a moment."

The hotheaded pilot blinked. _This girl is our connection with the resistance? But she's just a kid…_

"Now," Trine went on, "here's the situation as it stands now. As you've likely heard by now, the Ruddle team has, to date, been unable to take out the Suez Base, due to the defenses along the way; that's what we're here for." He nodded to Athrun. "Commander Zala?"

Athrun nodded. "Right." Stepping to the bulkhead, he activated a screen, and brought up a map display on it. "As you can see, the area known as the Lohengrin Gate is right at the end of this ravine, guarded by a Lohengrin positron cannon and a single mobile armor, codenamed the 'Gells-ghe'; beyond it are the Suez Base, the powerplant, and the town we're attempting to liberate." Entering another command, he brought up an image of the mobile armor itself. "This, in addition to the positron cannon, is what makes things complicated: the Gells-ghe is equipped with a positron reflector, much like the Zamza-Zah you fought on the way out of Orb territory."

"Then our mission is to destroy the Lohengrin and the mobile armor," Shinn said immediately.

_I think Kevin would remark that Shinn has a secure grasp of the blindingly obvious,_ Athrun thought, simply gazing at the younger pilot for a moment. _In this case, he might even be right._

"That's correct," he said aloud. "Exactly how we're supposed to do that is the subject of the next part of the briefing."

Shinn tossed his head dismissively. "I'll take care of everything, if I feel like it," he said arrogantly. "No problem."

Athrun's eyes flashed. _Your _attitude_ is certainly a problem, Shinn. It's no wonder a professional soldier like Kevin –or like King, for that matter- doesn't respect you. That kind of attitude will get you killed one of these days._

Then he smiled slightly. "All right, then," he said, startling Shinn. "We'll just leave the whole mission to you, then, if it's that easy for you."

Shinn blinked in sudden consternation, and Conille shook her head. "This is the guy you're sending out as pilot for this part of the operation? I don't know… You're the commander, shouldn't _you_ be doing it?"

Athrun shook his head. "No, I think Shinn is fully capable of accomplishing his mission." Stepping forward, he held out a computer disc to Shinn. "Here's the data on your part of the operation, Shinn."

The younger pilot refused to take it. "Maybe _you_ should be the one to do it," he said pointedly, "if you're such a great pilot. You're the one in FAITH, after all, _and_ the commander."

"Stop acting like a spoiled brat, Shinn," Athrun said in a deceptively mild tone. "If I didn't think you could do it, I wouldn't be giving you the assignment. Besides, Impulse can pull it off; Savior can't. And since you're the one who knows how to pilot Impulse…"

Shinn blinked, wavering, and Conille took the opportunity to add her own words. "There was an uprising in the town when ZAFT attacked the base before," she said quietly. "Those dissatisfied with the occupation tried to use the opportunity to do something about it. When ZAFT's attack failed, though, the Earth Alliance retaliated against the civilian resistance, using their full force to crush the uprising. Many fighters were killed… and so were a number of civilians who had nothing to do with it."

His mind flashed back to that terrible day in Orb, when the Earth Forces attacked… when his family had been caught in the crossfire. _Never again,_ he reminded himself. _This… is why I joined ZAFT in the first place, so that no one else would ever have to suffer what I did._

Without further objection, Shinn accepted the mission data. "So what's the plan, then?"

"The specific route is there in that disc," Athrun replied. "But the basic plan is this: _Minerva_ and the Gulnahan forces will go on ahead, serving as the obvious attack force against the Lohengrin Gate. Luna, Rey, and I will launch ahead of them, along with Gulnahan's BuCUEs, to engage the enemy mobile suit forces along the way; at the same time, _Minerva_ will engage the enemy mobile armor with Tannhauser fire."

"But the mobile armor is supposed to have a positron reflector," Shinn objected. "What good will _that_ do?"

"It's only to serve as distraction," the older pilot explained. "The Earth Forces don't know for sure that we know it's equipped with one in the first place; therefore, it shouldn't come as a surprise to them that we'd attempt to use positron weaponry on it anyway. Since we _do_ know, though, it'll keep them guessing long enough for our own mobile suits to get in range, and destroy it with melee weaponry."

Shinn nodded slowly. "So what's my part in this operation?"

Athrun brought up the display again. "There's a small tunnel running parallel to the main ravine," he said, tapping the image. "It leads directly to the Lohengrin cannon itself… and to the location of the Gells-ghe, which is why the rest of us need to distract it. The operative point is that the tunnel is far too narrow for a conventional mobile suit to navigate; that's why it's your job, Shinn. You'll have to go in with Impulse separated into its individual components, and reassemble when you reach the target itself. No room for a Silhouette pack either, I'm afraid, so you'll have to be careful."

"I can handle it," the hotheaded youth said confidently.

"It's not as simple as you might think," Athrun cautioned. "As I said, the tunnel is narrow… and your timing will have to be precise. Arrive too early, and either the mobile armor will be right in front of you, or you'll be caught in the Lohengrin's fire. Arrive too late, and the Lohengrin will have been lowered into a reinforced bunker, effectively inviolable. If that happens, this attack will be for nothing… and we won't get another chance." He met the younger pilot's gaze levelly. "Are you still so sure you can manage?"

"I am," Shinn said firmly. "I'll hold up my end." _I have to. This mission has to succeed… and I refuse to fail._

_Not before I've killed Walker.  
_

* * *

In the corridor outside, Luna fell into step with Athrun. "Nice job managing Shinn, Commander," she said approvingly. "I've never seem anyone get him under control that easily. It's not just you, you know; he's had problems with authority ever since the Academy, even talking back to his instructors a lot of the time."

Athrun sighed. "Shinn obviously isn't a bad guy," he said quietly. "But it's obvious he _does_ have issues. I can tell you right now that he'd never make it in Kevin's old unit; he'd either get discipline or wash out. Commander Arkanian would never tolerate that kind of attitude."

She bristled inwardly at the mention of Kevin Walker's name, but she managed to contain herself. "Then maybe Commander Arkanian would be mistaking a mistake. Shinn's too good at his job to give up on that easily."

"Kevin would say that someone with that kind of disciplinary record is more of a danger to himself and his comrades than to the enemy," he replied. "And even I have to agree there's a certain amount of truth in that. Mostly, though, I think Shinn just has a problem getting his feelings across to others." He smiled slightly, giving her an apologetic look. "I have that problem, too," he admitted. "I'm sorry, but socializing isn't quite _my_ strong point, either."

With that, Athrun walked off, leaving a perplexed Luna wondering if she ought to be offended. "You could've just said you didn't feel like talking…" she muttered. "And why do you always have to defend Walker…?"

Shaking her head, she turned, and left the vicinity.

* * *

Kevin Walker opened his eyes, and noted with some surprise that, not only was he still alive, but he didn't even seem to be injured. _Except for a blinding headache,_ he amended, and administered a dose of painkiller from his internal pharmacope. _Now… where am I this time?_

The sound of a hatch opening gave him his answer, as Leona used her neural receptor to pop Nemesis' hatch. "Still alive in there, mon ami?" she said dryly. "You took a bit of a bad step out there."

"More like a mountain of bad steps," he grunted, releasing his restraints. "I assume I'm back on the _Archangel_ now? And that Leviathan has been either destroyed or driven off?"

"Yes to the first question," she replied, extending a hand to help him out of the cockpit, "and I'm afraid we only managed to drive him off. He didn't seem interested in sticking around for a fight to the finish… which may be just as well, under the circumstances."

"Yeah… you may be right about that…" With his friend's help, Kevin climbed out onto Nemesis' outer hatch, paused a moment to get his bearings, and then dropped lightly to the deck… before being immediately half-tackled.

"You _moron!"_ Cagalli berated him, pounding on his chest with one hand. "Were you trying to get yourself killed or something! Going out there all by yourself-!"

"It probably wasn't the best idea you've ever had, Kevin," Kira agreed, walking over with his helmet under his arm. "You should've at least waited for Leona… if not ignored the trap entirely."

Kevin sighed, and reached out to lightly grip Cagalli's shoulder with his human hand. "I'm sorry," he said quietly. "I didn't mean to worry you… and you're right that I should've at least remembered Leona, and had her launch along with me."

Cagalli seemed to deflate, all at once. "Well," she whispered, "at least you're okay. But… what _happened_ out there? Kira and Leona said something about Mike Carnehan, but… how is that even _possible?_ I mean, after that time in Banadiya…"

"It's a long story, tovarisch," he said wearily. "A very long story… and I think we should move this conversation to the Bridge, where Murrue and Andy can hear it."

* * *

Murrue's eyes widened in shock. "Michael Carnehan?" she said, repeating what Kevin had just told her. "The Kraken… but he died three years ago, didn't he? I thought you always told us he died in Banadiya, the day you hunted down CARDINAL."

Kevin sighed. "Mike did die that day," he said quietly. "Cagalli shot him in the gut with an explosive bullet, and I finished the job by destroying his heart. I watched his vital signs fade, and his implants _did_ send out a KIA signal. Unfortunately… it seems there are still applications of our augmentation that I don't yet understand."

"A dead Destroyer, brought back to fight you…" Andy mused, expression thoughtful. "You really do have some determined enemies, Racher. Any idea who pulled this one off?"

"That's pretty clear now," Kira said heavily. "Foxhound's IFF now designates it as ZGMF-X15A/M Leviathan."

From her new position at communications, Lacus sighed. "So elements within ZAFT itself continue to operate as they once did," she said sadly. "And some of them still strive to kill Kevin… but for what purpose? Out of revenge for all the lives you took in the first war, or because you're in the way?"

"That's a question I don't think we can answer until we know the actual brain behind the orders," Kevin replied unhappily. "I'm fairly certain it's _not_ Delta, at least not in this case; she professed ignorance about the whole _Concepcion_ affair, and I think that I actually believe her about that. As to who else… well, I frankly don't have a clue. The obvious suspect is Durandal himself, what with this Meer Campbell woman impersonating you… yet despite his involvement in the ABADDON program, this doesn't seem quite his style."

"Agreed," Murrue said thoughtfully. "Well, that mystery will probably have to wait for now. What _I'd_ like to know is how Carnehan could possibly have been here in the first place, if he's dead."

Kevin grimaced. "An unforeseen application of cybernetics. According to Mike, his body was repaired, and then 'reactivated' via the cybernetic linkages throughout his physical structure; in essence, his body being controlled like a puppet… except that the puppeteer is inside the puppet. Mike himself is dead, I think, but it appears that a copy of his personality was left within his cortical implant and artificial neural network as data fragments, probably produced originally at the time he first became insane, and updated by some 'block box' program as time went on. When he was reanimated, those fragments came back together…"

"…And here he is," Andy finished, with a grimace of his own. "Now that's just sick."

_You're right about that,_ Murrue thought, herself horrified by the notion. _And all this, just to kill a nineteen-year-old… It's times like this that I wonder if Kevin will ever be able to find peace, with all the enemies he's made over the years…_

Lacus, having similar thoughts, chose not to air them either; instead, she brought up a related matter. "Kevin… what will you do? He's your brother, after all… can you really bring this to an end yourself? Can you act against him as you have against others?"

Kevin drew his revolver, and began twirling it as he thought. "…I honestly don't know," he said with a sigh. "I… Once, I tried my very best to kill him and my other comrades, but that was a product of sheer, berserker rage. Three years ago, I could have and did kill him… but Cagalli was being threatened by him, and that overwhelmed everything else, as far as I was concerned. But now?" He slowly shook his head. "I don't know…"

Leona stepped forward. "You won't have to," she announced. "Because if it comes down to it, I'll do it myself. I can fight with him on his own terms now, with my own enhancement complete."

"That presupposes that you can force him into battle on foot," Max interjected, stepping onto the Bridge. "And from what I can tell, that'll be quite the trick, Major." She turned to Kevin. "Boss, Nemesis is going to be out of action for a little while. Kojiro and I have initiated the nanorepair functions, but you took a _lot_ of damage; when Leviathan blew your wings off, he also damaged your PSA systems, and a lot of that failed in the crash, causing even more damage." She grimaced. "You were about two centimeters away from a containment breech in your reactor."

Kevin winced. "I think I'm glad the crash knocked me out. Seeing _that_ in my diagnostic would probably have made me just little bit _freaked."_

Coming from a man who had absolutely no fear of his own death, it was a highly unusual admission.

"I'm sure," his "daughter" said dryly. "Anyway, the operative point is that it's going to take a lot of work to bring down Leviathan. You're not too bad a pilot yourself, and with a machine superior to almost everything else out there, and you didn't stand much of a chance; I personally think that it's not likely to improve, either, I'm afraid."

Kevin sighed. "Then what are we supposed to do? Like you said, Nemesis didn't stand a chance; Prometheus designed Foxhound to be even greater than my old machine, and apparently succeeded. I'm not sure we've got anything that _can_ do the job."

"Not quite right," Andy said slowly, gazing thoughtfully at the other two pilots who had sortied in the battle. "Kira and Leona managed to drive it off today… Hm. Well, Racher, you have to admit that good as you are, you're not quite in Kira's league… and Nemesis, for all its raw _ability_, actually fights in a conventional manner, just faster and stronger than most."

"True, on both counts," his protégé agreed, wondering where the Desert Tiger was going with this. "I'm guessing you mean that Kira could do the job… and since I seem to be still alive, rather than having been finished off, I'm thinking that may be true. But what does my fighting style have to do with it?"

"The Illumina," Kira said abruptly, a light going on in his head. "Carnehan couldn't seem to cope with it; as far as I know, nobody else has ever used a weapon like that."

Andy nodded. "Exactly. Racher, I'm not saying you should completely give up on fighting him yourself, but I think it's going to be Kira and Leona that finish this one." He smiled. "But then, you always were better on the ground, weren't you?"

Kevin nodded slowly, eyes flashed behind his shades. "So the two of them either destroy it, or force it down… and once Mike's in _my_ domain, I finish him off myself."

"But, Kevin," Lacus protested, "he's your _brother._ He may be an enemy, but are you sure killing him is the right path?"

He met his sister's eyes levelly. "Lacus," he said quietly, "you never knew the original –sane- Mike Carnehan, but I did… and I know that he would rather die than be used the way he is now. Moreover, he isn't really alive even now; what we're facing is just a copy of his original personality."

"Copy though he may be," Murrue murmured, frowning in concern, "but he _is_ a form of your brother, Kevin. Leaving aside the issue of whether it _has_ to be done… _can_ you bring yourself to do it?"

Kevin looked away. "I don't know," he said, almost in a whisper. "But… I have to try. _Because_ he's my brother… I owe it to him to at least try to finish it."

* * *

"_The operation begins now,"_ Commander Joachim Ruddle said from the land battleship _Desmond. _"Minerva, _launch Impulse when ready."_

"_Understood,"_ Talia replied. _"Shinn, are you ready?"_

"Affirmative," Shinn Asuka acknowledged, from the centerline catapult. "Shinn Asuka, Core Splendor launching!"

The Core Splendor shot out of the catapult, and was quickly followed by the flyers carrying Impulse's chest and leg sections; in concert, the three craft plunged into a tunnel running alongside the ravine, exactly as planned.

As he entered the dark tunnel, Shinn took a moment to reflect on the plan Athrun had outlined. The data Conille Almeta had given them had revealed the existence of this tunnel, which ran parallel to the ravine all the way to just below the base of the Lohengrin cannon itself. Extremely narrow, it was too small for other mobile suits… which was why Impulse had been tasked with the duty. Its unique ability to separate into separate modules allowed it to slip neatly into the tunnel… and just as neatly sneak up on the unsuspecting Earth Forces.

"_From there,"_ Athrun had reminded him, just before launch, _"the rest of us will be attacking overtly, in an attempt to draw the mobile armor and the Dagger Ls away from your approach path. If that succeeds, you'll be able to attack the Lohengrin itself with minimal opposition."_

That was the _official_ reasoning, at any rate… but Shinn wasn't so sure. _He gave me this assignment because he didn't want to do it himself,_ he thought darkly. _If he's a "war hero", why couldn't _he_ handle a simple tunnel like this?_

_And why,_ he thought, irritation growing, _does this tunnel have to be so _dark?

* * *

Sitting in the command center of the Suez base, Major Charles Archer reflected that it had been rather peaceful in the area since the last ZAFT attack had been destroyed… perhaps too peaceful, considering how important his base was strategically.

Nonetheless, he was actually startled when his detection officer suddenly spoke up. "Incoming contacts, Major!" he called. "Heat sources identified as two land battleships and… the _Minerva,_ accompanied by a small force of BuCUEs. They look like they're heading right this way, Sir."

Archer frowned. "What do they think they can accomplish?" he wondered aloud. "The last time they made the attempt, we sent them home with crippling losses… Well, if they want to commit suicide, I won't complain. Launch the Dagger L unit and the Gells-ghe… and charge the Lohengrin."

"Yes, Sir!"

* * *

"It would seem they've spotted us, Captain," Arkanian noted dryly, observing Heim's sensor readouts. "We have incoming mobile suits, and that new mobile armor."

Talia nodded. "I know. Meyrin, have Commander Zala, Rey, and Luna launch immediately; it's time for our part in this mission to begin."

"Understood, Ma'am." Meyrin turned her attention to her headset. "Commander? You and the others are to launch at once."

"_Roger that,"_ Athrun replied, from Savior's cockpit. _"Athrun Zala, Savior, launching!"_

"_Rey Za Burrel, launching in Blaze ZAKU Phantom,"_ Rey said calmly, following his commander out into the air.

"_Lunamaria Hawke, Gunner ZAKU launching!"_ Luna finished, and headed out.

_Well,_ Meyrin thought, _they're off. Good luck out there, all of you. I have to wonder, though… will Walker really have to sit this one out, or will he somehow intervene anyway? Those Destroyers… you can never be sure exactly what they're up to, or why…_

That was a belief she'd held ever since learning that her elder sister's commander had fought with the Four Ships Alliance… and one which made her feel somehow uneasy about _Minerva_'s new "guest". Something about Natalya Ivanova Arkanian just didn't sit well with her…

"Dagger L unit entering range, Captain," Heim reported.

"Thank you, Bart," Talia acknowledged. "Malik, bring us up one hundred meters. Chen, charge the Tannhauser and prepare to fire on my command."

"Yes, Ma'am," the two replied, almost as one, and _Minerva_'s bow angled up, lifting her higher above the rocky ground, until the Dagger Ls were in clear view.

_So this is what it's like to be on the bridge of a warship in the middle of a battle in gravity,_ Arkanian thought, watching the unfolding situation with interest. She'd been present during the Second Battle of Jachin Due aboard a _Nazca_-class, and been a witness to several other space battles, but this was her first time on the bridge of a ZAFT warship entering combat on Earth. _Reminds me of those long-past days as a mercenary… I wonder, though; how did Kevin feel, traveling aboard the _Archangel_ as she made her way across the world? And… what drew him into that crew, that he would stay with them so loyally even now?_

She didn't have an answer to that question. She wasn't sure she'd _ever_ have an answer to that, either; particularly not if one of the myriad people after his hide managed to finally catch up with him, as seemed all too possible now.

Talia, oblivious to the former instructor's thoughts, only spared attention for the battlefield itself. Observing it silently for a moment, she nodded to herself as the Daggers came into clear view. "Chen… fire Tannhauser."

A moment later, the massive muzzle at the center of _Minerva_'s bow began to glow, and a powerful stream of red-orange fire leapt from the positron cannon, reaching across the intervening sky to smite the mass-produced Earth Forces machines… and then erupted into actinic light well short of its targets.

Talia grimaced at the massive flash, for she recognized the effect from their last encounter with an Earth Forces mobile armor, but she couldn't say that it came a surprise.

The Gells-ghe had appeared, and its positron reflector was fully active.

Her grimace intensified as the shockwave from the premature blast slammed into the ship, her consorts, and the BuCUEs; the powerful wavefront was strong enough to cancel the forward momentum of all three ships and their mobile suits, and even push them back a dozen meters.

_But they've made one mistake,_ Delta observed inwardly. _They've left us alive…  
_

* * *

"Not a bad strategy on their part," Archer noted, more to himself than to his staff. "Bringing in the _Minerva_ and the transformable machine Roanoke encountered was a good idea… but it's not likely to work, and I'd think they should know it."

"Because they don't have sufficient forces?" his exec opined.

He shook his head. "No; we proved last time that the size of their force wasn't the determining factor. No, the problem is… they've no way to counter the Lohengrin. Without a positron reflector of their own, they can't hope to survive long enough to accomplish anything." Archer nodded to himself. "All right, then, let's convince them their position is hopeless. Fire Lohengrin."

* * *

Athrun winced, seeing the red-orange barrage headed for his ship, but he didn't let it distract him; that had been allowed for when the mission was planned –they'd counted on it, in fact- and his own assignment required his full attention.

Converting the Savior into mobile suit mode midair, he headed straight for the Dagger Ls in his area. Equipped with Jet Striker packs, they could engage him in the air… not that it would help them much.

Athrun Zala was quite experienced at fighting Earth Forces pilots, after all.

Pulling out a Vajra beam saber, he met the first head-on clashing blades with the Earth Forces unit. "Die, you space monster," the Earth Alliance pilot hissed, struggling to push Savior's blade away… and then his eyes widened as the pressure was suddenly gone, causing his efforts to result in overextending his thrust.

Athrun's blade of frozen fire had pulled back, and now it darted back in, ripping into the Dagger L's torso in a bisecting cut that melted through armor, internal systems, and cockpit alike, before tearing out the other side.

The pilot was already dead; the subsequent explosion served only to scatter debris through the air, while Savior engaged its next target.

Below him, Rey and Luna went after the Daggers that hadn't managed to get airborne, or else had chosen to block the way of the ZAKUs deliberately; though their machines were less capable than Athrun's, they were nonetheless highly effective.

Luna threw her ZAKU to the right, allowing an emerald dart to flash past, and then triggered her cannon, unleashing a red-orange stream that punched straight through the Dagger L that had fired on her, blasting most of its torso to scrap.

It toppled, lay on the ground for an instant, and blew apart.

Rey, in his white ZAKU Phantom, leapt toward his first target, lobbing a fragmentation grenade at the same time. As he landed, his beam assault rifle came up, and he poured a short burst of emerald fury into a Dagger L at pointblank range, virtually melting it and setting off a chain reaction inside that resulted in an eruption of fire. When the grenade went off a few moments later, what remained vanished in the explosion… as did another pair of Dagger Ls.

Luna glanced at the destruction, smiled in grim satisfaction, and took an emerald dart on her shield, then lifted her beam cannon and triggered another shot, piercing her target at the waist. This one didn't explode; it simply flew apart in two halves, its legs having been separated from the torso by the blast… and its pilot vaporized during the event.

_That's more like it,_ she thought to herself, already turning her attention to her next target. _My performance at Armory One might not have made Erica proud… but now I'm finally living up to the red uniform, just like she did._

_And someday, maybe I'll be good enough to avenge your death, Sis… or help Shinn do it._

Up above, Athrun had returned to mobile armor mode, and now he slashed across the sky toward a pair of Dagger Ls, firing the plasma cannons mounted on either side of his main fuselage. The powerful red-orange bolts, each as hot as the sun itself, tore right through his targets, blasting them apart in a shower of flame and debris… and then a pair of emerald darts nearly took out _his_ machine, as they scorched up from the ground.

Glancing down, it didn't take Athrun long to determine where the attack had come from. _Minerva_ had successfully lured the Earth Alliance into firing the Lohengrin, before making a fast landing to dodge it, and now the cannon needed time to recharge… so they'd sent out the mobile armor again.

This time, Athrun would have to face it directly.

* * *

The tunnel came to an abrupt end, and Shinn sighed in relief. _Here we go,_ he thought, and triggered the Core Splendor's missile launchers to launch a barrage against the tunnel wall itself. The resulting explosion sent boulders into the open air… and permitted him to exit into the sky himself.

As the briefing data had indicated, he was right in front of the Lohengrin cannon itself, which was guarded by a half-dozen Dagger Ls… all of which were startled when the Core Splendor blasted its way out of the ground, summoned the flyers that had accompanied it, and swiftly combined to form the Impulse itself.

"Where did _that_ come from?" the lead pilot wondered aloud, lifting his beam rifle. "He just came right out of the-"

Shinn smirked, and sent an emerald dart straight through the machine's torso, detonating it in a hail of shrapnel before its pilot could even finish his sentence. _Well,_ he thought, _no sign of the Gells-ghe; the Commander must've held up his end of the operation after all. Guess he's not completely useless…_

Lunging forward, he moved to his left at the same time, allowing a burst of green fire from another Dagger L to pass harmlessly over his right shoulder, instead of going through Impulse's head the way the enemy pilot had clearly intended. He spared only enough attention from his current target to turn Impulse's head and trigger his CIWS; the burst ripped into the Dagger L's beam rifle, rendering it essentially a small bomb whose detonation damaged the machine's hand, and then the ZAFT unit turned back to the other mobile suits.

By the time he'd reached his third victim, Shinn could see the Lohengrin begin to descend into the ground, no doubt into some kind of hardened bunker. _It just means I'll have to take care of the rest of them a little faster,_ he thought, unconcerned. _As long as I can reach it before the hole closes behind it, I've got nothing to worry about…  
_

* * *

The Gells-ghe was big, and had a few powerful weapons… and that was about all Athrun Zala could say for it. In the past, he'd gone up against any number of difficult opponents, and in his experience, it was mobility that mattered more than firepower. Even the old Stormhawk would've been nothing without its high-speed maneuvering.

And while the Gells-ghe could fly, that didn't make it nimble.

Athrun had chosen to remain in mobile armor mode for his initial assault on it, and now he slashed across the sky toward the big mobile armor, firing his plasma and beam cannons as he came. They were completely ineffective against the Gells-ghe's positron reflector, of course… but they could and did make it difficult for the machine's gunners to target_ him._

Which gave him time to get in range to use attacks that _would_ work. _This isn't the Justice,_ he thought to himself, _but a beam saber is a beam saber… and as long as I haven't lost my touch with close combat, this shouldn't be too hard._

"ZAFT's new machines are good," the mobile armor's pilot complained, trying to follow Savior's flight path. "That's as maneuverable as a Raider Full Spec… Bring it down, now!"

"Trying, Sir," one of the gunners answered, swinging the beam rifles the Strike Dagger-like torso held.

"But… he's fast…" Gritting his teeth, the gunner squeezed off a pair of shots, only to curse as the pair of emerald darts when wide, with Savior barrel-rolling over them. "Bastard!"

Athrun shook his head, swinging around behind the insectoid mobile armor. "Size isn't everything," he muttered. "Sometimes, it just makes you a bigger target…" With a quick series of commands, he converted Savior back to mobile suit mode… and drew a beam saber with his free hand.

"He's behind us," the second gunner said tersely. "Firing aft cannon."

Athrun saw the dual-barreled cannon on the Gells-ghe's rear fuselage fire, but he ignored it completely; firing solid shells, it wouldn't pose a problem for a PSA-equipped machine. Instead, he let the shells harmlessly detonate against his torso armor… and darted forward, flying _beneath_ the mobile armor and coming up in front of it. _Time to take care those rifles,_ he thought.

The Gells-ghe's pilot's eyes widened, and he started to back his machine off as soon as he understood his enemy's intent… but it was too late. Savior slashed down and to its left, biting into the mobile armor's right arm at the elbow, then reversed the motion, slashing through the left arm at the wrist.

Both damaged appendages hung for a moment… then fell away, connections torn and melted, and exploded.

"Bastard!" the mobile armor's pilot hissed. "All right, then target him with the cannons and finish him off before he can-"

Athrun was already in motion again, dropping beneath the Gells-ghe… and lashing out with his saber again as he did so. The blade of frozen fire penetrated the armor like it didn't exist, melting and ripping through critical systems, power cables… and the engines that kept the mobile armor flying.

As quickly as it had dropped beneath the Gells-ghe, the Savior veered away again, as Athrun knew better than to remain underneath such a large mass of metal when gravity began to win the war.

"Mission failed!" the mobile armor's pilot radioed. "Repeat, mission failed. All crew, bail-!"

The Gells-ghe struck the ground, started to smash apart… and erupted in a flash of fire and light, as the explosion hurled it –and its unfortunate crew- in all directions.

* * *

Shinn noted distantly that the Gells-ghe had been destroyed, but deemed it of no consequence to his current mission. The Lohengrin was descending fast, and he still had three more enemies to eliminate. _Not that Daggers of any kind are ever much of a challenge,_ he thought derisively.

Ducking under a saber thrust from one, Shinn stuck his beam rifle right against its hatch before it could recover, and sent a lethal dose of emerald energy straight through its cockpit and out its main thrusters. A moment later, it ripped apart at the seams.

"Don't let him through!" one of the remaining Dagger L pilots warned his surviving companion. "Just hold him off a little longe-"

An emerald dart took his mobile suit through the waist, cutting off his transmission and his life in a cataclysmic display of fire and flying debris.

_Let's finish this,_ Shinn thought, turning to the last combat-effective Dagger L… and drew the Folding Razor combat knives stored in Impulse's hip armor.

The Dagger L pilot saw him coming, and yanked out a beam saber. "I don't think so," he hissed, and lashed down just as Impulse entered its range.

_I don't think so._

Shinn threw himself to the left, not far enough to completely avoid the blow but enough that it left only a shallow furrow in his shoulder armor… and then he was in range himself, left arm thrusting forward to ram the knife into the Dagger L's upper torso.

Paralyzed, the machine fell back, and Shinn turned his attention back to the unit he'd effectively disarmed earlier in the engagement.

The Lohengrin was now fully underground, and the shutters above it had begun to close; there were only seconds left to complete the mission.

Terrified, the Dagger L pilot managed to use the machine's left hand to pull out a beam saber… but at the instant he tried to ignite it, Shinn threw his remaining Razor knife… directly into the Dagger L's cockpit, and its pilot.

_There!_ The machine was already sparking, but Shinn had plans for it other than just letting it explode. Instead, he kept moving forward, and slammed Impulse's shoulder into it, knocking the Earth Alliance machine backward… directly into the cavity containing the Lohengrin.

Exactly as Shinn had intended, the mobile suit landed directly atop the positron cannon, and exploded on contact.

The explosion tore the Lohengrin itself apart in an impressive display all its own, but the worst was yet to come. The force of the event traveled back through to the Earth Alliance base itself, and more balls of fire began to light up the sky…

* * *

The battle was over; ZAFT had won. In the wake of the demonstration of the spectacular weaknesses of both the Lohengrin cannon and the Gells-ghe mobile armor, ZAFT reinforcements had begun arriving to take full possession of what remained of the Earth Alliance base.

As Impulse came to a halt on the outskirts of the town and powered down, Athrun likewise climbed out of the Savior, and reflected on the days events. _Can't say I approve of what they're doing to the Earth Forces soldiers,_ he thought, recalling how the local resistance had ruthlessly dealt with the surviving Alliance troops, _but I guess it was inevitable… and at least we were able to liberate them in the first place._ He gazed up at the Impulse, as its hatch opened. _And Shinn followed orders and completed his part of the mission without a hitch…_

Shinn reached the ground, and strode over to his commander. "Good work," Athrun said approvingly. "Congratulations on a job well done, Shinn."

The younger pilot scowled. "Yeah, well, it wasn't easy. You forgot to warn me that tunnel was gonna be pitch black, you know. I could've died in there, failing the mission before I even reached the objective."

"It didn't stop you, did it?" Athrun retorted with a slight smile, trying to show the hotheaded young pilot that he really _was_ impressed with his performance. "I told you I was giving you that assignment because I was confident in your abilities, and it looks like I was right."

Shinn hesitated, taken aback by the praise. "Well… I appreciate the confidence," he said, calmer yet also a bit more uncertain, unsure of what to make of the praise. "Next time, though, I'd like to have at least a _little_ warning if I'm going to be flying blind."

"I'll see what I can do."

Further conversation was interrupted by their personal radios. _"Shinn, Commander Zala,"_ Talia called from _Minerva, "with your mission complete, I'd like you both to return to the ship. Time to get some rest… and we also appear to have visitors on their way here."_

"Roger that," Athrun replied. "We'll be returning shortly." Deactivating his transmitter again, he exchanged a confused glance with Shinn. "Visitors?"

The younger pilot turned to the south, squinting at the sky. "…I think she means _that,"_ he said, pointing.

Athrun followed his gaze… and nodded in sudden comprehension. The black and gray color, leg-like forward hull, and graceful wings told the tale: the Prometheus Fleet Mobile Assault Ship _Dominion_ had arrived…

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

Nemesis and Leviathan have clashed, and Nemesis has come off the worse. In the clash between brothers, Kevin Walker faces a grave challenge in Michael Carnehan's stolen machine… one which he may not be equal to.

The Suez Base falls; ZAFT has struck another blow against the Earth Alliance, as Shinn begins to come into his own as a pilot… and the rogue warship _Dominion_ returns at the frontlines at last.

Yes, I know, this chapter is _extremely_ late, but I'm afraid it was unavoidable. Determined though I may be to complete my writing, even I can't do it when I catch the flu, and even now I'm only just recovering from it. My next update shouldn't take _quite_ this long… Anyway, let me know how this chapter was. –Solid Shark


	20. Chapter 20: Remembrance

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk**

* * *

_The sea is vast and infinite…_

Those were Kevin Walker's thoughts as he stared out through the observation deck's huge viewport. Behind him on the deck lay his jacket, shirt, and gloves, leaving his intricate scar patterns and gleaming metal arm plainly visible. This was a time when he needed to remember the past, not hide it behind his traditional black…

Normally, he avoided this place while the _Archangel_ lay submerged, as the sight of the vast ocean depths reminded him all too much of one of his deaths, three years earlier; today, though, the super-soldier found the setting fitting for his mood… and what he contemplated.

"Six years," Kevin whispered to himself. "Six years, and it still remains fresh in my mind… and after three years, another of my greatest regrets returns…"

Meeting Michael Carnehan again had been a terrible shock… and one which reawakened guilt he'd thought put behind him long since, the guilt that still tied him to the ABADDON Project, which had vanished in nuclear fire six years before. _But,_ he thought, flexing his metal hand while his human one traced his own scars, _the past never does truly die, does it? We are all a product of our pasts… and it is my sins that drive me even now. More than vengeance, I seek redemption… and justice._

Kevin sighed. "But I'm no knight in shining armor…my armor is tarnished, my purpose clouded. Everything eventually leads back to my worst memories… to you, tovarisch."

Unbidden, the shade of the woman he addressed appeared before him, just on the other side of the transparent aluminum viewport. _"Still brooding about what you did six years ago, are you?"_ Rachel Carver said softly. _"You still can't let it go?"_

It was only with an effort that he could meet her eyes. "How can I? After what I did… it's not that easy to move on, Rachel. I… I thought it was, but it isn't. Not as long as I still remember you, and all the others."

"_You can remember us without holding onto the guilt,"_ she pointed out. _"Do you honestly think I'd blame you for what happened, knowing what brought it about in the first place?"_

"Alec does," Kevin said quietly. "If he weren't trying so hard to keep a low profile, he might've killed me back on the _Minerva._ I'm not the only one who hasn't forgotten, you know… and you _are_ his sister, after all."

Rachel snorted. _"That's Alec for you… appropriate you two were the serpents in the unit. Just like you, he holds grudges till they die of old age, then has them stuffed and mounted. Look, Kev, Alec is Alec… but I honestly don't think he'd kill you. Rough you up a bit, sure, maybe leave you in Medical Section for a few months, but he wouldn't actually kill you."_ She smiled faintly. _"I think he knows I'd never forgive him if he did."_

"But I… I failed you," he whispered. "I let you die…"

She smiled faintly. _"Dilly-dally shilly-shally. Isn't it time you did the forgiving, Kev?"_

Kevin looked away. "Maybe… but I don't know that I _can_ forgive myself, tovarisch. After everything I've done… And now, even Mike is back…"

Rachel's eyes widened for an instant, and then the shade nodded slowly. _"So that's why you're thinking so hard about me again… He's in Foxhound, then?"_

"Yes… as a reanimated corpse whose only thought is revenge." He reluctantly looked up again. "Rachel… I have to kill him. It's the only option left, and probably the kindest thing I _could_ do for him. But… I don't know that I can do that to him again."

"_You do what you have to do, Kev,"_ she replied. _"Think about it. We both knew Mike during the Project; how would the Mike we knew react to the Mike you faced in Banadiya, and saw as a puppet in Foxhound?"_

Kevin sighed. "…He'd want me to finish him. But Rachel… I've already done it once, and I tried to the day I… killed the rest of you. To do it again…"

Rachel pressed a ghostly right hand against the viewport. _"You're not alone, Kev. You're never alone. You've got your friends… and you'll always have me by your side, no matter what. In memory, I'll always be with you…"_

He tentatively raised his own left hand, pressing it against the viewport where hers was. "I'd… like to believe that, Rachel. But… I can't even decide now if the path I walk is the right one. I swore to avenge your death… but is that the right thing for me to do?"

"_Only you can determine your own course, Kev,"_ she answered. _"I would say you have nothing to atone for at all… but if that's the path you see before you, walk it without hesitation. Trust your instincts, and travel the path you believe in. No one can make that determination for you."_ She paused. _"And for what it's worth… you've at least made sure no more will suffer what you experienced. ABADDON may have been revived, but there's no way Delta would allow _that_ kind of atrocity."_

"Yeah… I guess you're right. Still…" Kevin closed his eyes. "I wish you were still around, tovarisch. We couldn't be what we once were… but there's no one I'd rather have at my side on the battlefield, and few friends I've had have lived up to you."

Rachel chuckled. _"I'm flattered… but at least you wound up with the person you should have, in the end. So the Princess of Orb was the one, all this time… she's a lucky girl, you know that?"_

"I'm the one who's lucky, Rachel," he told her. "Luckier than I deserve…"

Behind him, the hatch slid open, and Cagalli Yula Athha stepped into the compartment. Looking over at the super-soldier, she saw his lips moving, and heard faint words, but saw nothing he might be speaking to. _Huh? There's no one here…_

She quietly cleared her throat. "Who are you talking to, Kevin?"

Kevin twitched his shoulders. "Nobody, tovarisch, just remembering the past." He let his hand fall from the viewport, and idly flexed his metal one. "It's… been on my mind a lot lately."

Cagalli nodded. "I'm not surprised, after everything that's happened." Her eyebrows went up then, as she noticed the shirt and jacket lying discarded on the deck. _He almost never lets even me see his scars… or his arm._ "You know," she said quietly, "you never did explain why you never replaced the skin on your right arm…"

He didn't reply at first, leaving Cagalli to simply watch him, noting as she did the intricate patterns of old scars, and the powerful musculature –even without augmentation- that his ever-present black outfit normally hid. A man who, at the age of nineteen, had already devoted nearly half his life to combat, and in the process become a truly powerful individual… yet also one who knew what that power cost.

"…It's a symbol," Kevin said finally, raising his metal fist to look at it. "A symbol of the past… of everything that's happened to me in the past six years." He turned to meet her gaze, jade eyes somber. "I spent three years running away from it, before coming face to face with Mike in Banadiya, then finishing Patrick Zala at Jachin… but even then, it only touched on my life. Now…"

"Now?" Cagalli prompted, stepping to his side.

"Now… it's all coming back." He turned to look out at the ocean again. "I can feel it, tovarisch. Everything that happened six years ago… even my own genesis, twenty years ago, it's all coming to a head now. My father has resurfaced, Alec and Delta are back, Hyperion's running around trying to help me –or so he says- another member of the old unit was sending me cryptic messages a couple months back… there's even a new ABADDON unit." He shook his head. "Fate is taking a hand again, Cagalli. This time around, there's going to be some kind of conclusion, I can feel it. And… I think it's eventually going to lead me back to the ABADDON lab itself."

She gripped his metal shoulder. "You really think it'll come to that?"

Kevin sighed. "It's looking that way. Tovarisch, Hyperion, at least, has technology that even _I_ can't currently reproduce… and that means the ABADDON base still exists, even if only as a wreck. And as long as it's sufficiently intact for usable data to be gleaned from it, all sides are going to be after it; certainly ZAFT, and that means Prometheus and FOX will eventually have to head them off. And…" He closed his eyes. "If I am ever to put this behind me, I have to see it again with my own eyes."

Cagalli gazed at him searchingly. "…That's not all you're worried about. Are you afraid of… of seeing ghosts up there? Of what you'll find?"

"Oh, I'm afraid of that, all right," he admitted readily. "I've never seen a ghost, but if they do exist, they'll be up there. And… there's still Mike to deal with, right here and now."

"And one way or another, you'll deal with him," she said confidently, pulling him into an embrace. "If you can't do it, then Kira will, or Leona, or even that Hyperion guy. You're not alone, Kevin; you're never alone anymore. Remember that you can count on all of us, 'kay?"

Kevin carefully returned the embrace, managing a slow smile. "Yeah… yeah, I know I can… just like always…"

He would not restore his arm to a human-like appearance until everything was resolved; as he'd said, it was a symbol of his past, a reminder of the past that still needed resolution. But the simple physical contact between the two of them… _that_ was a symbol of how his life had changed for the better, in the years since ABADDON.

Kevin Walker would confront his past… but he would not have to do so alone.

* * *

Shinn Asuka and Athrun Zala watched in shared bemusement as the Prometheus Fleet Mobile Assault Ship _Dominion_ set down next to _Minerva,_ its black and gray hull somehow reconciling its foreign shape with _Minerva_'s own.

"What on earth is _that_ doing here?" Shinn demanded, looking over at his superior. "I didn't know that ship even still existed!"

Athrun shrugged, fully as confused as the younger pilot. "I have no idea," he admitted. "I'm not surprised she's still around, but to see her here… Even I'm not sure what Kevin's up to this time, to be honest." _But he must've cleared it with somebody high up somehow,_ he thought. _It got through Gulnahan's defense zone without being shot at, so presumably they knew it was coming…_

Presently, the ship's main airlock opened, allowing three figures to depart… all of whom promptly made their way to _Minerva,_ where they conferred briefly with a guard, then stepped aboard.

"I guess someone knew they were coming," Athrun mused, "and told them what to say when they got here… but I don't have any idea _what_ they're doing here."

"Probably some trick of Walker's," Shinn muttered, but there was no true rancor in his voice. Much as he despised Walker himself, he couldn't bring himself to extend that feeling to everyone associated with the man. _After all,_ he admitted to himself, _not all of them are from Orb… and just knowing about what he's done doesn't make them accomplices or anything. At least, not all of them…_

His eyebrows went up then, as he realized what two of the figures looked like. "What the…?" he breathed. "One of them _was_ Walker! And another looked just like him!"

Athrun frowned. "One of them must've been Invictus," he explained, inwardly wondering about the matter himself. "Quiet guy, wears battle armor most of the time. A trained assassin with an Australian accent, he used to work for Rau Le Creuset, before joining the Clyne Faction and then the Four Ships Alliance. He also happens to be one of Kevin's clones."

Shinn blinked. "…So how many of him are wandering around, anyway?"

Athrun shrugged. "Hard to say. Invictus and Jack Carter –you encountered him during Break The World- are the only ones left with augmentation, but I understand Carter created quite a few clones on his own…" He shook his head. "Doesn't really matter right now, I suppose. Come on, we'd better get aboard; I have a feeling the captain will be calling for us soon enough anyway, what with _Dominion_ showing up."

* * *

As Athrun had expected, Talia was indeed waiting for them in a conference compartment when they returned to the ship.. and she wasn't alone. "Commander, Shinn, I'm glad you're here," she greeted them. "I was just about to send for you… These people, it seems, have come here on their own mission, one related to our own."

The two ZAFT pilots took a moment to look closely at the newcomers, and Athrun smiled as he recognized two of them. "Captain Badgiruel," he said warmly, "Invictus… it's good to see you two. Never expected to see you _here,_ though."

"Neither did we," Natarle admitted. "But the Colonel made a promise some time ago, and with _Dominion_ finally redeployed, he had the chance to make good on it, so here we are."

"Yeah," Invictus concurred. "Under direct orders from my esteemed 'brother' to come straight here, and link up with _Minerva._ Oh, yeah," he added, nodding toward the third member of their group, "this fellow here is also part of our mission… the one that involves stopping certain parties from killing us all. You may not recognize him, but-"

Shinn's eyes widened for an instant, taking a good look at the third man, and then narrowed in anger. "Walker!" he hissed. "What do you think _you're_ doing-!"

The black-clad man, who did indeed look like Kevin Walker, winced… and only then did Athrun notice that he had a distinct lack of scars, and carried an autopistol –not a revolver- at his right thigh. "Please," he said, with an aggrieved air, "don't mistake me for him when I haven't gotten rid of him yet. My name is Jack Carter, thank you."

That gave Shinn pause, leaving him mildly confused… but for Athrun, the effect was rather greater. "Carter?" he repeated, stunned. "But… but you've tried to _kill_ Kevin, more than once. Why are you…?"

Talia leaned back in her chair. "That's a tale I'm interested in hearing as well," she admitted. "I recall you aided us during Break The World, Mr. Carter, but I was under the impression that was a temporary alliance of convenience, nothing more."

Carter grimaced. "It was, Captain Gladys… until a certain gray-haired lunatic decided to take over my operation, and use _my_ resources to finish off Walker… and, as the opening move of his little coup, tried to neutralize _me."_

She nodded slowly. "So you've decided to come together against a mutual enemy… I can understand that." She tilted her head. "Does that make your truce permanent, then?"

The clone hesitated, clearly wanting to deny the statement… but then slowly shrugged. "…Maybe," he admitted. "I don't like that I'm nothing but a clone of that man… but an acquaintance of mine has started me thinking a little differently these days. Maybe…"

"In any case," Invictus cut in, when his "brother" faltered, "we're working together at least until we bring down Father, and that's part of why we're here. Twenty years ago, he was active in Eurasia, and we're hoping to find some clue to his activities here. And maybe… a cure."

Talia's eyebrows went up. "A cure to what?"

Athrun, however, realized quickly what his assassin friend was talking about. "Snake Eater," he stated. "That's it, isn't it."

Invictus nodded. "Exactly. You see… all three of us are dying now. Our augmentation is handling it for now, but Jack and I, being clones of Kevin post-modification, are affected by Snake Eater just as much as he is. Exactly how he managed to activate it is still a mystery –and we're not sure how he got to _me_ in the first place; Natarle and I were away from civilization for almost two years- but with Jack's activated during the coup, and my own beginning to manifest, we need to find out what he did, and how to stop it… before it's too late."

Talia nodded sympathetically. "No offense to either of you, but I think I'm glad I'm not part of Colonel Walker's extended family; it sounds like you have a few too many people trying to kill you."

"You can say _that_ again," Carter said under his breath.

Ignoring the ill-tempered clone, she turned back to Natarle. "So, Captain Badgiruel," she said now, "may I ask what _Dominion_'s other mission is at the moment? I assume you didn't just happen to drop by this place."

Natarle smiled. "No, we didn't. Actually, Captain Gladys, we're the 'friends' the Colonel promised to send along, when he first gave you the warning to leave Orb."

Talia blinked. "I'd actually forgotten that," she admitted. "Of course, at the time we were unaware of Colonel Walker's continued military operations… I should mention, though, that we'll need to clear this with Chairman Durandal, at least before we can begin true cooperation."

"Not… necessarily…" Athrun said slowly, frowning in thought. "Certainly he should be informed… but, Captain, I think we can handle this ourselves." He nodded at Natarle. "In my view, _Dominion_ is, at this point, completely trustworthy; Kevin is a man of his word, as you know, so until and unless ZAFT does something directly contrary to Prometheus' intentions, _Dominion_ won't act against us. That said, my judgment is that we can work with them… and as you and I are both members of FAITH, we have the authority to authorize a joint effort ourselves."

She started to speak, then paused, taken aback. _That's right… as members of FAITH, we have broad discretionary powers… and since Gil himself has indicated Prometheus is on our side…_

Talia nodded slowly. "All right, then," she said at last. "Commander, I concur with your assessment; since ZAFT has changed much from when Colonel Walker was actively hunting us, and the Earth Alliance is something he clearly still harbors hatred toward –and the small fact that he's twice chosen to aid us personally- I agree that _Dominion_ is almost certainly trustworthy at this time." She turned to Natarle. "Captain Badgiruel, I thank you for your assistance. I should warn you now that not everyone in ZAFT that we're likely to encounter will be quite as trusting, but I believe Chairman Durandal will accept the arrangement." She stood, holding out her hand. "Would you pass on my thanks to Colonel Walker?"

Natarle shook the older woman's hand. "Certainly, Captain Gladys. I should mention now that we're not at liberty to employ _Dominion_'s full capabilities, as the Colonel prefers to keep some things to ourselves at this time; also, at the moment we can only deploy one mobile suit, since our other three units are still working up. Nonetheless, I think the assistance of an _Archangel_-class mobile assault ship and ZGMF-X09A Justice will be something of an advantage for you."

"Indeed," Talia agreed. "I can understand your confidentiality requirements, Captain; Chairman Durandal has seen little point in attempting to conceal our own capabilities from Prometheus –he apparently believes you've already found out most of it, for one thing- but then we're a national militia, with commensurate resources, and only one major enemy, while you…"

"They're a small group of high-tech renegades," Athrun said dryly, "with a habit of being targeted by practically the entire Earth Sphere." He turned to Carter. "You still have the Justice?"

The clone smiled faintly. "Naturally. It proved itself at Break The World, and saved my hide from Onishi… and I'm afraid I'm not very inclined to give it up."

The blue-haired pilot shook his head. "Somehow, I'm not surprised… Either way, though, I somehow doubt _Dominion_ would allow it to be transferred over anyway. If I know Kevin, there's no way he'd approve returning it to ZAFT, under the circumstances."

"I'm not sure _I'd_ approve of it, either," a new voice said, and Natalya Ivanova Arkanian stepped into the compartment. "Certain matters that Kevin Ivanovich has brought to my attention indicate a group similar to the rogues from Break The World is still operating within ZAFT, and people such as that would view Justice as quite a prize. Yes, better to leave it in Prometheus' hands, at least for now."

Athrun instantly felt something inside him tense; he remembered Kevin warning him about the woman, and he knew the young super-soldier didn't give out such warnings lightly. And besides… _She's dangerous… the way she moves, you can tell she could tie you knots without hardly trying…_

Invictus' reaction was somewhat different, as he gazed at Arkanian through narrowed eyes. "So you're Delta," he said, voice level. "Interesting to finally meet the woman whose RNA gave rise to some of my more useful skills."

"And you'd be the assassin called Invictus," Delta said in return. "Le Creuset's private hatchetman, before you struck out on your own… somehow, I'm not surprised to see you in Prometheus uniform." She raised an eyebrow. "Gave up the shadow life, did you?"

"Mostly," the assassin acknowledged. "Getting married tends to change a guy's outlook on life a little, you know?" He twitched his shoulders. "So, I guess we'll be working with you, as well."

"Technically, yes," she agreed. "I doubt we'll be seeing much of each other, though; I'm afraid I have my own responsibilities, which occasionally draw me off to the far corners of the world. Besides, I'm no mobile suit pilot. I leave that to the professionals, just as I do shiphandling."

Talia frowned inwardly, wondering about the tension that had entered the room along with the ABADDON leader. _I wonder if Delta did something Colonel Walker didn't like,_ she mused. _I wouldn't put it past her, if she thought it served the interests of the PLANTs… and if she did, no doubt word would've gotten to _Dominion…

She cleared her throat, drawing attention back to herself. "Well," she said carefully, "now that we've all introduced ourselves to one another, perhaps we should get down to business. Shinn," she went on, turning to the hotheaded –and currently scowling- pilot, "I realize you have… issues with Colonel Walker, but I expect you to remember that not all of Prometheus is responsible for anything he might've done… and they are, at this time, on _our_ side."

Shinn hesitated, clearly torn –as he _did_ remember that, deep down- and then nodded. "Understood, Captain," he said quietly. _They're _not_ all like Walker,_ he reminded himself. _They might not all know about what happened at all… and there's no sense getting bystanders caught up in his destruction._

Partly satisfied, Talia turned to Natarle. "Captain Badgiruel, we should, perhaps, begin going over our next step, if you're going to be coming with us. Our next destination is Diocuia, a city on the coast of the Black Sea…"

* * *

In an office located at the "top" of a seemingly-defunct space colony at L4, every side save the floor consisting of a viewport, a gray-haired man with jade eyes absently tapped his fingers on his desk… or rather, the desk that had once belonged to one of the clones of his younger son.

"We seem to be suffering from a multitude of problems, Benedict," he said to the other occupant of the room. "A multitude indeed…"

The clone –one of the "elites" Carter had allowed enough intelligence to lead strike forces, a fact which had unwittingly led to his own exile from the base- wore a form-fitting suit of unpowered body armor, derived from a set Carter had been issued while still part of Project Serpent Head. He also wore a grim expression, one which showed his agreement with his current master. "Too true, Baron," he agreed sourly. "A number of loose ends these days."

John Tyler Onishi nodded. "Starting with my miscalculation six years ago, and more recently with that Allster girl's escape… not to mention Invictus' survival." He grimaced. "At least it got Bitter off our hands, but I think that's the last time we send attack dogs against my son or his two 'primary' clones."

"Probably wise," Benedict agreed; he'd come a long way since betraying Carter, and was now the closest thing the baron had to a confidante. "We might've succeeded against Carter, though, had he not managed to reach the Justice."

The baron raised an eyebrow. "A subtle rebuke, Benedict? Gently pointing out that if I'd gone out personally, I might've stopped him?"

"Not at all, My Lord," the clone said calmly, smiling faintly. "True, its unlikely Justice, even piloted by a Serpent Head, could've escaped Stormhawk, but at the time neither of us had any reason to suspect he'd be able to reach it in the first place." He shrugged. "At any rate, if all goes well all three of them will be dead within months."

"If," Onishi repeated, grimacing again. "Applying the radiation trigger was simplicity itself, but their systems are even more robust than I'd anticipated; eventually, we need to revisit the ABADDON lab, try and find out just what kind of life expectancy they have at the moment… At any rate, it's beginning to look as if Snake Eater won't work fast enough for our purposes. We need to take more direct action, Benedict."

Benedict gave his master a shrewd look. "Are you suggesting that it's time to return to Dol Guldur, My Lord?"

"I am," the baron confirmed. "I see no need to overthrow Unato's pathetic puppet government quite yet –until the other factors are in place, it's more convenient to play along with the Earth Alliance- but simply gaining access to the base itself will be advantageous. I have no doubt Kevin has already destroyed any data on his own operations, and evacuated all sensitive equipment, but it's unlikely he bothered to take much else with him. If nothing else, he hasn't even had the transport capacity to remove the REX units since _Concepcion_ was taken."

"And that arsenal can be used to take more direct action against Prometheus and FOX," Benedict mused. "Makes sense… Shall I have the hangar begin prepping the shuttle for launch, then?"

Onishi nodded. "Please do, Benedict. The sooner Dol Guldur is under our control, the sooner the rest of the plan comes together…"

* * *

_It's a good thing,_ Talia reflected, _that Commander Arkanian has a built-in quantum radio, or else this arrival might be very interesting indeed._

She sat on _Minerva_'s Bridge as the ship came to a rest in Diocuia… with the Prometheus Fleet _Dominion_ to her starboard. The ZAFT authorities within the city had been more than a little concerned by the _Archangel_-class battleship's presence, but Arkanian had managed to clear the arrangement with Durandal himself during the journey, as he himself had arrived in Diocuia for the upcoming events.

"_Interesting place,"_ Natarle remarked over the radio, from _Dominion_'s Bridge. _"Hard to believe we're in Eurasian Federation territory…"_

Talia nodded. "I know what you mean, Natarle," she said wryly (the two of them had gotten on a first-name basis during the voyage… if only to avoid confusion). "I suspect we'll be getting used to it, though. In the wake of Break The World, Eurasia's been splitting apart at the seams, with quite a few places actually sympathetic to the PLANTs."

"_Hm… well, tolerance of Coordinators isn't entirely unprecedented for Eurasia,"_ Natarle conceded. _"Well, maybe not tolerance, exactly, but not really aversion, either; one of the Colonel's mercenary friends was used as a covert operative by Eurasia until the Colonel, ah, eliminated Admiral Garcia."_

The ZAFT captain blinked. "So Colonel Walker really _did_ personally assassinate Garcia? I always thought that was just a rumor."

_Dominion_'s captain shook her head, smiling faintly. _"It's no rumor, Talia. It took him till we took over Artemis Base, but the Colonel finally admitting to personally shooting Garcia in the heart, just before leaving the base."_

"Ah… did he say _why_ he assassinated an Earth Alliance flag officer?" Talia asked carefully. "That's a bit blatant, even for him."

Natarle shrugged. _"As I understand it, the Colonel had just interrogated him as to the whereabouts the Blue Cosmos double agent who killed his mother; then Garcia made the mistake of recognizing him as a Destroyer, so the Colonel finished him off to cover his own tracks. And besides… I think he was more than a little irritated at how Artemis treated the _Archangel_ in the first place."_

In the background, another voice spoke up before Talia could respond. _"Docking complete, Captain,"_ Meryl Steiglitz announced. _"Crew can now depart the ship without being squished."_

Natarle's mouth twitched at the non-regulation report. _"Thank you, Meryl,"_ she dryly, _"it's always nice to know exiting the airlock won't result in instant death."_ She turned her attention back to the link with _Minerva. "Talia, I'll see you in the city; I've got to get my ship squared away, and then I'll meet you –and the Chairman, I expect- at the base."_

Talia nodded. "Understood. I've got a few details to take care of, myself."

As the communications link closed, Arthur Trine looked in bemusement at the city before them. "There seems to be a lot going on out there," he remarked, puzzled. "Is all this because of the Chairman's presence, or is something else going on?"

She shrugged, equally perplexed as she, too, caught sight of the unusual activity at the ZAFT base. "I have no idea," she admitted. "But I suppose we're going to find out…"

* * *

Athrun was one of the first to debark from _Minerva,_ accompanied by Lunamaria and Meyrin Hawke; he, too, was wondering about the commotion, and the two sisters had decided to head out at the same time.

"Is that some kind of stage?" Meyrin said, perplexed. "It looks like it's for some kind of concert or something… but at a military base?"

"It is a little strange," her sister agreed. "Well, I guess I can understand some kind of celebration; I mean, ZAFT _has_ held the initiative ever since the nuclear attack was defeated. Still… what _is_ going on today? Unless… Wait, what's that?"

Athrun followed her gaze upward… and his eyes widened as he caught sight of the mobile suits descending from the sky. A ZAKU Warrior –incongruously painted _pink-_ was being gently lowered toward the ground by an old DINN and a state-of-the-art GOUF Ignited… and someone was actually standing in the ZAKU's hands.

His eyes widened still further as he realized who it was. _That's Meer! But what is she doing here? Why would she…?_

Luna, oblivious to his inner wondering, turned to him with a questioning expression. "Did you have any idea Lacus Clyne was coming here today?" she asked.

"No," Athrun admitted, as the ZAKU came to a rest, and the impersonator began to sing, "I didn't. This is the first I've heard of it at all."

She blinked. "But… aren't you her fiancé?"

He stiffened inwardly. _That's right… it was never made public that my father broke off the engagement…_ "Well," he improvised, inwardly hating having to deal with the matter at all, "we've both been busy lately, her with her career and me with flying combat; it's been a little hard to keep in touch lately."

Luna nodded, accepting the fabrication. "I should've figured. I mean, it's not like things have been exactly calm since you got here, what with the battles… and Shinn being a handful."

Their exchange was interrupted by Yolant and Vino, who charged by in a determined search for a better place from which to view the concert. Athrun, remembering their opinion of "Lacus", grimaced to himself; he'd once caught them admiring "Lacus'" new look, in a manner he felt sure Kevin Walker would've found intolerable had they been speaking of the real Lacus.

_In fact, I think Kevin would probably threaten them with injury over it, given how protective he is of his family… and with the way those two have been acting, I might even help._

"Lacus sure is more… energetic than she used to be," Meyrin remarked, watching the performance with something akin to awe. "I guess she's changed her style since the first war…"

"Yeah," Athrun agreed, controlling his tone carefully. "I don't imagine Kevin was very happy with it, though," he went on (truthfully, though not for the reasons his companions thought). "In fact, I'd say he wasn't happy about it at all."

Luna rolled her eyes, but Meyrin simply looked at him curiously. "What does Colonel Walker have to do with it?" she asked, honestly curious. "I mean, I know they must've known each other during the days of the Four Ships Alliance, but…"

Athrun paused, wondering how to handle that, then shrugged inwardly. _Better use the old story,_ he decided. _That one was just obscure, not classified… _"Kevin happens to be the nephew of the late Siegel Clyne," he explained. "It's not well known, but he and Lacus are actually first cousins."

That got even Luna's attention. "What? Lacus Clyne is actually _related_ to…?"

He nodded. "They've been close ever since they were children… and you should know by now how, ah, protective Kevin can be of those close to him." He shook his head. "If I know him, he'd be mildly horrified by how Lacus is acting right now –he _was_ raised as a nobleman, after all- and in all probability Vino and Yolant would've gotten something of a talking-to… at best."

Luna winced. "Yeah, I can see that… and actually, I think that's one thing I could agree with him on. Those two…"

"They're passing through a phase –I think- one which Kevin never experienced… and has no patience for." Athrun smiled faintly. "Kevin's attitudes on the matter are a little… emphatic." _And that's putting it mildly, really…  
_

* * *

Having by now made their way to the area of the concert itself, Talia and Trine stood with Natarle and Invictus, watching the proceedings with some interest. As they did so, Talia also noted Durandal watching from nearby.

"I wonder what he's doing down here," Natarle remarked, seeing the direction of her gaze. "Patrick Zala never did that during the last war; if he had, I'm sure the Colonel would've found out about it, dropped whatever he was doing, and gone to, ah, 'greet' him."

"I'm sure," Talia said dryly. "But the situation isn't exactly the same. During the first war, Earth was mostly either neutral or against us; the few locations actually on our side weren't safe enough, with the possibility of Earth Forces aircraft shooting down any diplomatic shuttle before it could reach safe harbor. Now, on the other hand, even portions of Eurasia have taken our side, and we have almost complete control of space, so the tactical situation is rather different. That said…" She shrugged. "I don't really know, either. Perhaps he wants a word with us, specifically."

"Well," Invictus noted, "if he does, it shouldn't be too hard to find us later; I'm wearing battle armor, and Natarle here is the only person within shouting distance in a Prometheus Fleet uniform."

Talia nodded. The Prometheus Fleet uniform was of ZAFT styling, but completely black, save for the old-style rank insignia and the unit patch, in this case showing a representation of _Dominion_ against the black of space, with her name spelled out beneath.

Among the sea of more colorful ZAFT uniforms, it was hardly inconspicuous.

The two captains returned their attention to the concert itself… but Invictus himself took the opportunity to activate the quantum radio implanted in his left mastoid process. _"Invictus to Angel of Death,"_ he subvocalized. _"You reading me, Boss?"_ Though it had originally felt strange to call "himself" that, the clone-assassin had long since gotten used to it.

"_I'm here, tovarisch,"_ Kevin Walker replied, from several hundred kilometers away. _"I presume you and _Minerva_ have reached wherever it was you were going?"_

"_You got it, mate. A place called Diocuia, along the coast of the Black Sea."_ He smirked. _"You're probably familiar with it from when you were shooting your way across the world, five years ago. Anyway, I thought you might be interested to know that Durandal is here… and so is Meer Campbell."_

Kevin hissed audibly. _"Another of her infuriating little concerts? Figures… Durandal does seem to like flaunting his little puppet."_

"_She _does_ think she's doing the right thing, Colonel,"_ Invictus reminded him, suddenly serious. _"Of course, if you do give the order, I won't hesitate, but…"_

His "other self" barked a harsh laugh. _"Don't worry, brother mine. I'm not very happy with her, but she's not done anything overt yet; even I won't authorize a termination order when all she's done is sing. If she goes into active warmongering, _then_ I might authorize it, but for now… Anyway, she's more useful right now as bait. If she wants to play at being Lacus, and take the spotlight, I'm happy to let her. That means _she's_ the target of assassins, not our sister."_

"_Roger that, Colonel. What about Durandal, though? Anything special?"_

"_Just don't let him know we think he's behind Mike's revival,"_ Kevin said simply. _"Play it by ear, and let your wife do most of the talking."_

Invictus grimaced. _"Not a bad idea. She always was better at that sort of thing. I'm a more gentle person than you are, but I'm still more of a 'take them out from the shadows and hide the body' kind of guy than a diplomat."_

The man who shared his genes snorted. _"Endemic to the condition, tovarisch; we may be different now, but given that we started out with the same memories –not to mention genetic code- it would be a great surprise if you turned out to be a closet pacifist or something."_ He snorted again. _"Well, that's about all I should have to say right now; and I've got to get back to helping Kojiro and Max fix Nemesis. Over and out, Invictus."_

Talia, having noticed the assassin's brief preoccupation, raised an eyebrow. "Talking to yourself, Commander?"

"Sometimes it's the only way to have an intelligent conversation," Invictus replied sardonically, and turned his attention back to the concert… which was just ending.

Her singing over, Meer Campbell stood straight and tall in the ZAKU's hands, and gazed out at the assembled ZAFT soldiers. "I'm honored to be here today," she called out, smiling at the soldiers. "I'd like you all to accept my personal thanks for all the hard work you've done in the defense of the PLANTs; it hasn't been easy, I know, but I'm grateful, and so is everyone in the PLANTs. Your hard work is keeping us all safe, and for that, we can't thank you enough."

A cheer went up at that, and Invictus, unnoticed by all save Natarle, minutely shook his head. "That'd be more meaningful if it came from the real thing," he muttered under his breath, "instead of a cheap copy that dresses like a tart and sings like a hyperactive kangaroo…"

"I realize it's still a long road ahead of you all," Meer went on above, "but please, continue your fight for peace. This time, the war need not lead to great bloodshed… and I feel sure that if you keep working toward peace, it _will_ not."

Another, louder cheer rose up… and Invictus had to resist a strong temptation to bury his head in his armored hands in disgust…

* * *

Just beyond the base's outer fence, a trio of teenagers had also been watching the concert… though with a rather different perspective from the ZAFT soldiers, one as different as their allegiances… and their genes.

Once the singing stopped, the three of them walked away, climbing into a waiting car. "I'll admit she can sing," Auel Neider remarked. "At least this trip wasn't completely wasted."

Sting Oakley shrugged, starting the car. "True," he admitted. "Too bad she's the enemy, though; one of these days, we're just as likely to be tasked to kill her, you know. A shame to lose that singing, but she is what she is…"

"It wouldn't be difficult," Stellar Loussier opined dispassionately. "She has guards, but they'd be no real threat."

Auel glanced at the reserved young woman, and shook his head. _No fazing her, is there?_ "So," he said aloud, "you think we'll still be attacking the _Minerva_ after this?"

"That's what Captain Roanoke says," Sting replied. "She's still our primary target, after all; she has the two remaining Second-Stage units aboard, and she's also destroyed two of our bases almost completely unsupported already." He shrugged. "It doesn't really matter that much to us, anyway. Whatever the outcome of the war itself is irrelevant as far as we're concerned; for us, it's kill or be killed. It's that simple."

"Hmm… maybe so," Auel murmured. "Still… you know the presence of that rogue _Archangel_-class will complicate things. Arguably, she's more dangerous than _Minerva,_ what with _two_ positron cannons, and whatever upgrades –and mobile suits- she might've been given. Remember, rumor has it that ship belongs to Prometheus Fleet."

"Walker's organization, yeah," his fellow Extended acknowledged. "Okay, so maybe _Dominion_ –if that's what it is- could be a problem, but it's only one ship, Auel. Enough numbers will take out even that… and you know rumor _also_ says that we have another _Archangel_ or two under construction ourselves."

"Point," Auel conceded. "But there's also the Eurasian incident to remember."

That, Sting had to admit, was a point. Even now, the Earth Alliance had been unable to determine the cause of the total destruction of Peter the Great Base, or what had happened to the one man who had apparently survived, Major Chernitskaya. Some of the traces found at the scene suggested weaponry heretofore used only by Kevin Walker, but if it had been him, Earth Alliance Intelligence believed he would've already used it again in the weeks since.

Still… "Eurasia's little incident probably isn't our problem," Sting mused. "Whoever it was didn't come anywhere near where we've been operating; they probably don't know anything about _us._ Besides, it hasn't happened anywhere else since then. They probably haven't perfected whatever was involved there." He shrugged. "Like I said, all we have to worry about is whether we kill… or are killed ourselves."

* * *

Within _Archangel_'s hangar, a single figure stood, a shadowed form on the catwalk in front of the still-ravaged form of MBF-M1000B Nemesis. Wearing a form-fitting suit of black unpowered body armor, with Prometheus insignia, the entity known as Max Walker looked over her "father's" machine with clinical interest… but that interest only occupied a part of her mind.

_Kevin Walker,_ she thought. _My father… in more ways than one. Chief Simmons created my program, but it was based on algorithms created by Kevin himself. In that sense, he _is_ my father… and now we're connected genetically, too._

_But…_

A female voice penetrated the silence, which interrupted her train of thought. "You look like a woman with a serious matter on her mind," Leona Colde remarked, walking toward her; the ex-NGSF soldier's augmented eyes penetrated the gloom with ease. "Am I right?"

Max sighed. "It's… nothing you need to worry about, Leona, just a… personal matter."

"Something that affects one person on a ship this size tends to affect everyone," Leona said reasonably. "Am I wrong?"

The black-haired woman was silent for a long moment… then lifted her head. "Am I… human?" she whispered.

The question took Leona by surprise though she didn't show it. "Of course you're human, Max; or as human as any Destroyer is, anyway. What brought this on?"

The ex-AI sighed again. "Leona… it's not that simple. I… started life as a computer program. You know that. It was by an accident and we still don't understand how I even became self-aware in the first place; I'm the only AI to have ever actually pass the Turing Test, you know. As such, I was a sentient being, one with her own hopes and dreams… and one of those dreams led me to the creation of this body, and my sacrifice of what could've been immortality. But… Well, I know Kevin has existential issues, wondering whether he's crossed the border between man and machine, but at least he started out biological. Whatever happens, he knows he has everything a mortal man should… but I don't have that assurance."

Leona tilted her head. "What is it that you're worried about, mon ami?"

"I…" Max hesitated. "How do I know… that I'm not merely a program inhabiting human flesh? My digital mind was downloaded via the implants, became fused with the brain… but there's more to being human than having body and mind. Both of those can be quantified scientifically, however imperfectly; that's how I came about in the first place, as a being of electrons and logic. Beyond that is something that _can't_ be quantified, that which binds it all together."

Her crimson eyes, with their catlike pupils, glowed softly in the dark, as she whispered, "Do I… have a soul?"

Leona sighed. She and the young "daughter" of Kevin Walker were much alike, in many ways, to the extent they sometimes seemed like sisters. _And as sisters would… we have much the same issues._ "Max," she began quietly, "I've had… issues over the years myself. I once wondered about my own soul, not about its existence, but about what I'd done to tarnish it; I only realized there was hope for redemption after I met Kevin. One thing I have learned, since then."

She reached out, and laid a hand over Max's heart. "You are standing before me, is proof that you exist… and the beating of your heart proves that you have life. As long as you can feel that burden yourself, the weight of life… it means that you are alive. However you came into being, mon ami, there is no doubt in my mind that you are fully as human as any of us."

Max inhaled deeply. "…Thank you," she said quietly. "I guess I… just needed to hear that from someone else. I don't know that I can fully believe that yet… but maybe with time, I can."

"Take my advice, mon ami," Leona told her. "Find something to believe in, and fight for it. When you find something for which you would give your life for and your reason to live… _then_ you will know that you are as human as any of us."

Then the female soldier vanished into the darkness as silent as she she had come…

* * *

An hour after the concert, Talia arrived at a government building within the city itself, accompanied by Rey Za Burrel and the two representatives from _Dominion_. Now that the concert was over, it was time to get down to the business which had brought them all to Diocuia in the first place.

They were quickly escorted to a secluded courtyard atop one of the building's walls, where Durandal himself was waiting for them. "I'm glad you all are here," he greeted, smiling. "I believe we have a lot to discuss, don't we."

Natarle, about to speak, was surprised when Rey actually ran over to the Chairman and hugged him. "I'm glad to see you, Chairman," the pilot said, sounding happier –and in the process expressing more emotion- than the Prometheus Fleet officer had yet seen him.

As the two exchanged greetings, Invictus watched with narrowed eyes. _There's something strange going on here,_ the assassin thought, his old training coming to the fore. _Very strange for a ZAFT redcoat to greet the Chairman of the Supreme Council in such an… enthusiastic manner. There's more of a connection between those two than meets the eye…_

"I'm surprised to see you down here on Earth," Talia remarked, after Rey had stepped back. "It's a little unusual for the Chairman himself to come this far."

"Some things are better handled in person than over the radio," Durandal replied with a slight shrug. "Particularly as regards our new allies." He nodded to Natarle. "It's an honor to meet you, Captain Badgiruel. I've heard about your exploits during the last war."

Natarle shrugged. "I'm not very proud of my actions between the Battle of Alaska and the hijacking of _Dominion,"_ she admitted. "But Jachin… well, it was under the Colonel's orders, but I have to say I'm satisfied with the job we did there."

He nodded. "Yes, eliminating Muruta Azrael did the entire world a favor, Captain. I realize Colonel Walker's own motive was vengeance, but it was a laudable act nonetheless." He turned to her companion. "And you'd be Invictus, then? Rau Le Creuset's private assassin?"

"That's right," Invictus acknowledged. "I usually use the name John Tyler these days… but until the war is over, I prefer to go by my old codename. And yes, I used to work for Le Creuset… until our purposes diverged, and I joined with the Clyne Faction."

"Quite understandable," Durandal agreed. "Le Creuset's actions may have been covered up, but I'm well aware of them myself; what he might have done had you remained in his service is probably better imagined than experienced."

"I'll agree with you there," the assassin said fervently. _As it was, the maniac nearly killed Kira and Kevin…_

"Well," the Chairman said, turning once again to Natarle, "I must say, Captain, that I find your presence somewhat surprising. Believe me, I'm grateful for Colonel Walker's offer of assistance, but it seems… out of character for him to do so."

She shrugged. "He still doesn't entirely trust ZAFT," she admitted. "In fact, for various reasons, he's currently very wary of you. However, until his own investigation into the matter is complete, he believes it's in our best interests that the PLANTs receive what assistance we can give against the Earth Alliance. I'm afraid our own actions will be limited somewhat by the need to keep some of our capabilities confidential, but the Colonel has instructed me to inform you that for the time being, we're to cooperate with you as well as we can within those confines."

"I appreciate it," Durandal said with a nod. "I also appreciate the restrictions you may be under; my own top field agent has noted there may be reason for the Colonel to be wary, and I'm inclined to trust her judgment, however… unpalatable it may seem." He raised an eyebrow. "And, I understand, you also have a mission of your own, as well."

"That's right," Talia answered for her fellow captain. "And personally, Chairman, I think that mission is one we should do our best _not_ to interfere with, however accidentally. In my view, Baron Onishi's plotting is fully as much a threat to us as it is to Colonel Walker himself."

"Entirely possible," he conceded. "I knew the man, once upon a time; what he may be up to now, though, is beyond my comprehension. In any case, however, it's obvious his intentions are hardly benign."

"You can say _that_ again, mate," Invictus muttered, reflexively checking his own vital signs. "If he's benign, then I'm a bandicoot…"

* * *

"Weird that the Chairman himself is here," Luna remarked to Athrun; the two of them, along with Shinn, were in a car, nearing the government building the other officers had arrived at earlier. "For him to have come all the way to Earth…"

"I'm sure he has his reasons," Athrun replied neutrally; he himself really had no idea what was going on either. _I guess this is what it's like when you're on the inside again, without a high-ranking father; you lose sight of the big picture…_

"It must be important," Shinn opined quietly. "Especially since _we're_ being called to meet with him."

"Yeah," Luna agreed. "That _is_ a bit unusual. I mean, Commander Zala I could understand, but us, too? Something must be up."

As there wasn't really anything more to be said about it, the rest of the short trip proceeded in silence, until they arrived at the building itself. To their collective surprise, there was already a ZAFT redcoat waiting for them there. Blonde-haired and green-eyed, he was a cheerful-looking individual… and he, like Athrun, wore a FAITH emblem on his uniform.

"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance," the redcoat greeted, when the trio climbed out of the car. "I'm Heine Westenfluss. Like you," he added, nodding at Athrun, "I'm a member of FAITH… and you'd be Commander Athrun Zala, right?"

Athrun nodded. "That's right. These are Lunamaria Hawke, and Shinn Asuka."

"Pleased to meet the two of you, as well," Heine said politely, giving them each a speculative look. "I've heard some stories about you already; you're becoming well known within ZAFT." He smiled. "I'm afraid my carrier hasn't been quite as spectacular, but that may change; I pilot a new GOUF Ignited… and I'm soon going to be transferring to your ship."

Athrun's eyebrows went up. "You are? Well, that's good; we can always use more pilots, especially after _Minerva_ lost most of her mass-production mobile suits –and their pilots- in the battles in orbit."

"Well," the other man said, with another smile, "I hope to change that record." He waved a hand. "We can discuss that at a later time, though; I think I've kept you from your meeting with the Chairman long enough."

"We'll see you later then," Athrun said, with a polite nod. He was actually looking forward to it; Heine reminded him somehow of his late friend Nicol Amalfi, who had perished in the previous war…

"He seems like a cheerful guy," Luna murmured to him, as they made their way into the building. "Could be just what we need on _Minerva:_ somebody who doesn't take life too seriously."

"Maybe so," Athrun conceded. "Can't hurt, anyway." _Odd, though,_ he thought to himself. _She's acting more friendly now, herself…Maybe because Kevin's name hasn't come up?_

That was certainly a possibility, he knew. Kevin Walker was something of a sore spot for her… but he was also the _only_ real point of conflict for them. _In that case, I'll just try to leave him out of this. Shouldn't be _too_ hard, since he himself likes to stay out of sight, out of mind…  
_

* * *

When the three of them reached the courtyard where Durandal and the others were waiting, the Chairman greeted them with a smile. "Welcome, all of you," he said pleasantly. "I've heard all bout your recent achievements… particularly yours, Shinn Asuka," he added, turning his gaze to the young pilot. "Your skill and success is such that a request has recently been made to decorate you for your performance… and I feel quite sure it will be granted. I read the reports regarding your actions at the Lohengrin Gate, and I must say I'm quite impressed by them."

Shinn shrugged, a bit uncomfortable with praise from such a high-ranking personage. "I was just following Commander Zala's battle plan," he said quietly, not quite meeting the Chairman's eyes. "I did the work, but he came up with the plan."

Durandal's smile didn't falter. "And I commend him for that, but that does not in any way undervalue your contribution to the battle. Thanks to the efforts of you pilots, and the _Minerva_ herself, Diocuia and many other towns and cities have been liberated from the now-unwanted presence of the Earth Alliance." He paused then, and gestured toward the nearby table. "But I'm forgetting my manners. Please, everyone, be seated; we've much to discuss, and accomplished soldiers such as yourselves shouldn't be left standing around."

Once they'd all found seats, Talia looked to the Chairman, eyebrows raised. "So," she began, "how have things been going in space? We've not been in contact with the Homeland much later, save through Commander Arkanian, and her priorities have little to do with the strategic situation in orbit."

He shrugged. "There have been a few sporadic battles," he admitted. "We hold the advantage in orbit, but the Earth Alliance shows no sign of giving up what territory they do have as of yet." He smiled faintly. "Of course, they've had a few additional complications of late; on a handful of occasions, an unidentified mobile suit that seems to be resemble a Four Ships Alliance machine from the last war has ambushed and destroyed Earth Alliance mobile weapon squadrons, before vanishing without a word to watching ZAFT forces."

Natarle cleared her throat quietly. "That would be Prometheus' work, Your Excellency," she admitted, with a small smile of her own. "A… covert operative of ours, working directly under the Colonel's orders. He's been engaged in certain investigative activities I'm not at liberty to disclose, and apparently still likes to cause the Earth Forces difficulties when his orders give him sufficient leeway."

"Somehow, I'm not surprised." Durandal's expression turned serious. "Unfortunately, however necessary though it may be, it's another symptom of the situation. As history, both recent and ancient, has shown us, the path to avoiding war is far more difficult to find than that which leads straight into conflict."

Shinn shifted in his chair, troubled. "Um…" he began hesitantly, unsure of whether he was permitted to speak, under the circumstances, and unwilling to chance his usual attitude when speaking directly to the leader of the PLANTs.

The Chairman, however, simply smiled encouragingly. "Please, speak," he urged. "A new perspective is always welcome, particularly under these circumstances."

The pilot nodded, gaining some measure of confidence from the words. "Well… it seems to me that while avoiding war is of course the best scenario, sometimes it isn't possible to. When the other side attacks you, there isn't really any choice but to fight in your own defense, or that of others."

Athrun, surprised by Shinn's perceptiveness, nodded slowly. "When there are things in this world you want to protect," he murmured, "sometimes you have to fight for them… That's what my best friend told me once." He looked up at Durandal. "Cagalli also once asked me… what is the point in fighting? The cycle always brings about more death… I've searched a long time for the answer to that question, and I haven't quite found it even yet, despite coming back to the battlefield again."

Durandal nodded gravely. "I take it, then, that you don't find your friend's answer to your liking."

Athrun knew what –and who- the Chairman was referring to. "It's not that I don't _like_ it," he said slowly. "The fact is that Kevin's answer, that he fights for those he deems worthy of his loyalty, is the right one for him; I've known that much for a long time. But seeing the path that leads him on… I don't know that it's quite the right answer for _me."_ _The path of destruction, where he keeps his loved ones safe solely through fighting… it fits for someone as inextricably tied to battle as he is, but I'm not the same kind of man he is…_

The Chairman nodded again. "Well then, perhaps you'll find your answers this time, Athrun… now that you're fighting for your own ideals, instead of your father's." He turned then to Athrun's hotheaded subordinate. "Shinn, let me ask you something. Why do you think humanity has never been able to rid itself of war?"

Shinn shrugged…. But his eyes were clear and confident this time. "Because there are foolish people in every age," he replied steadily, "who believe in forcing their ideals on others. People like Blue Cosmos."

"A good answer," Durandal said thoughtfully. "But not, perhaps, the _entire _answer." He motioned toward Heine's orange GOUF Ignited, visible from the courtyard's height. "There's also greed. If war is viewed as an industry, it's the most profitable business in history; in any war, the arms dealers are the ones who really come out on top."

Athrun tilted his head. "Are you leading up to something, Chairman?"

"Yes," the older man said quietly. "Blue Cosmos, you see, doesn't stand alone. Fearsome as it is, it's merely a fragment of a larger whole, part of an organization known only as Logos. Hiding in the shadows, they manipulate world events to best suit themselves."

The pilot drew back in surprise. "Even Blue Cosmos… is only a part of something bigger?" he whispered. "So what Kevin did two years ago…"

"Merely delayed things," Durandal agreed with a sigh. "Destroying Muruta Azrael was a brilliant stroke, and there's no denying it hindered Blue Cosmos' operations greatly, but it was merely a setback; they have a new leader, and Blue Cosmos is not Logos' only tool."

"We know that," Natarle said, reentering the conversation unexpectedly. "We've known it for some time now."

He turned to her, mild surprise on his face. "You have? In that case, I must admit to some surprise that Prometheus hasn't been active before now, given your Colonel's hatred of Blue Cosmos…"

She grimaced. "Unfortunately, even the Colonel's pockets have limits, Your Excellency, and building a military force from scratch doesn't come cheap. Suffice it to say that we have more than enough power to fend off any likely attack against us, and then some… but this war caught even us off guard. We don't have any real force projection capability, especially since our latest prototype was lost."

"Yes," Durandal murmured, "I was informed of that myself… This, then, is perhaps a very convenient alliance indeed, for the both of us. We both wish to deal with the situation… but even together, it will be difficult."

Natarle drew herself to her feat, as did Invictus. "We've done the difficult before, Your Excellency," she said quietly, voice level. "We did it with only four ships and a small group of mobile suits. We can and we will do what we have to in order to bring this conflict to an end."

Invictus looked slightly less convinced, but Athrun chalked that up to Prometheus' apparently institutional distrust of Durandal and most of the rest of ZAFT. "So you're actually willing to assist ZAFT this time around?" he asked quietly.

"Better to fight the devil you know while looking for the devil you don't," Invictus said simply. "At least that way you can accomplish something against one even if you don't find the other. We may not exactly fully trust ZAFT at the moment, but willing to work with them as long as our goals coincide… and as long as _we_ aren't betrayed."

"Not very trusting, are you?" Shinn remarked, a trace of his usual attitude coming to the surface.

Invictus looked at him calmly. "Considering that our own father is trying to kill us," he said softly, "I think we have reason to be paranoid, Asuka."

…_He has a point there,_ Shinn conceded inwardly. He couldn't help but be envious that the two "senior" Walkers –the original and the one with the original's memories- still had a family… but he could understand their predicament. _Being hunted by their own father, for reasons they don't even understand… it's almost enough to make me actually feel sorry for Walker._

_Almost._

"Well," Durandal noted after a few moment's silence, "it's getting rather late, isn't it? Captain Gladys, Captain Badgiruel, I realize you need to get back to your ships; you pilots, though, are welcome to stay here for the night, and return to _Minerva_ in the morning."

Athrun inclined his head. "Thank you, Chairman. I appreciate it."

Luna and Shinn also expressed thanks, but Rey politely shook his head. "I'd rather return to _Minerva,_ if you don't mind."

Durandal nodded. "Of course." He turned to the assassin. "What about you, Invictus? You're welcome to stay as well, if you wish."

Invictus slowly shook his head. "No, thank you," he said quietly. "I… prefer to remain with my own ship. My past isn't as troubled as my brother's, but I have my share of nightmares."

"I know a little of what you've been through, Invictus, and I must say I can easily imagine that. I understand completely."

_No,_ Invictus thought, as he and Natarle walked away. _You _don't_ understand. You can't… not without experiencing it yourself.  
_

* * *

Durandal and Athrun stepped out of the building to see their comrades off; and just after the respective groups left, a limousine pulled up in front of them, carrying a very familiar passenger and her companion in the back.

The doors promptly opened, and Meer Campbell practically leapt out of it -followed more sedately by what Athrun presumed to be her manager- and came running up the steps. "Athrun!" she called, practically throwing herself at him. "It's good to see you!"

"Uh, hi, M- er, Lacus," Athrun said, flustered to the point that he nearly used her true name. "It's, ah, good to see you, too."

Durandal smiled to himself. _That must be a bit awkward, at that…_ "Lacus," he said aloud, "since you're here, perhaps you might join us for dinner?"

"Of course!" Meer replied energetically. "I'd be delighted!"

"Then why don't you head inside? I'd like to speak with Athrun alone for a moment."

"Certainly." The impersonator broke away from Athrun, and she and her manager made their way into the building itself.

Once they were gone, Durandal moved closer to the pilot. "Have you heard what happened to the _Archangel_ after she left Orb?" he asked quietly.

"Only in general terms," Athrun replied. "Kevin spoke with me after the battle in the Indian Ocean, but he didn't give much detail." He grimaced. "He's… not quite as understanding about my rejoining ZAFT as I might've hoped."

The Chairman nodded sagely. "Coming from him, I'm not really surprised… I wonder if he has the real Lacus Clyne with him, as well?"

"Yes," Athrun said, "he does; that much he _did_ confirm. I think he's reluctant to let her out of his sight right now, really."

"I see… Well, please let me know if you do hear anything from them. They could be valuable allies, you know."

"True," the pilot conceded. "If I do hear anything, I'll let you know… and I ask that you do the same."

Durandal nodded. "Of course. No doubt you're just as interested in getting into contact with them as I am."

_Maybe more,_ Athrun thought to himself, as they walked back into the building. _The problem is… with Kevin's influence, I'm not sure how interested they are in getting into contact with _us._ Not after everything that's happened…_

He could only hope Kevin's paranoia wouldn't get in the way of doing the right thing… but with his current attitude toward ZAFT, nothing was guaranteed. Sending _Dominion_ showed how he felt now, but if something else happened to damage his attitude toward ZAFT…

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

In an alliance in defiance of Kevin Walker's past actions, _Dominion_ has joined forces with ZAFT's _Minerva,_ hopes that mutual efforts will defeat a mutual enemy… and meanwhile, Kevin Walker and his former-AI "daughter" seek their own answers to their lingering doubts…

With _Minerva_ and _Dominion_ arriving in Diocuia, there is time for both crews to rest, before the battles begin anew… while elsewhere, John Tyler Onishi prepares to return to Orb at last…

Yeah, I realize this is probably late, but hey, it was a long chapter; even I can't type those up any faster. Oh, yeah: either shortly after or shortly before you read this, there'll be some editing done to Chapter 19, with additional material added in response to critiques.

In the meantime, though, let me know how this one was. –Solid Shark


	21. Chapter 21: Ominous Calm

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk  
**

* * *

"_It's interesting how two people can have several of the same personality traits, yet be diametrically opposite in attitude. My origins are those of a soldier, born and bred for a war whose purpose I do not yet fathom; despite my father's wishes, though, I long ago swore my allegiance to Cagalli Yula Athha, my best friend, my girlfriend, and my liege. According to the code of honor I follow, I am sworn in her service until death, following the oath I made as a child. To me, nothing is more important than my family, and those I have sworn to protect._

"_The same, I believe, is true of Shinn Asuka. He shows traits of a protector, in his fierce devotion to those close to him… but his unresolved hate leads to destruction, his lingering anger a weakness that spurs him to recklessness on the field of battle. He could be a formidable presence on the battlefield, but he is empty; everything about him traces back to that one day in his past, when his family vanished. He cannot put it out of his mind, and so it dominates his every action, leading him to be reckless and foolhardy._

"_We both protect and serve, and we both have grief-filled pasts… but where he uses that anger as a burning-hot weapon against his foes, I use my cold fury to fuel my actions, not control them; he takes vengeance against any target he can find, even for deaths that are not the result of deliberate acts. I exercise my wrath only against those who have done me or my family deliberate harm._

"_There's no doubt that the boy has potential; I'll freely admit that, were it not for my cybernetic advantages, he might well _equal_ my skill… but as he is now, he could never exceed it. Bound to his past, unwilling –or unable- to control his anger, he is easily provoked, and that leads him to mistakes… mistakes that could be fatal._

"_For he also has a pathological hatred of Orb, which seems focused on me… for now. His outbursts on _Minerva_, directed at Cagalli, show a dangerous trend… one which he ought to know could easily lead to his own destruction._

"_If he attacks her, not even my friendship with Athrun will hold me back. The moment Shinn Asuka becomes a serious threat to her, he will die by my hand…_

"_For that is my desire, and my duty, to the one to whom I swore my oath, the one whom I love…"_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War_, by Force Operation X Colonel Kevin Walker

* * *

"Isn't it a little early for you to be writing your memoirs, Kevin?" Cagalli Yula Athha asked, amused, as she stepped into the cabin.

Shutting down his terminal, Kevin Walker flexed his fingers, working out the mild stiffness in his human hand. He could've done it by neural receptor, of course, but he'd never felt comfortable typing by thought command…

"I usually find it best to get my thoughts down while they're still fresh," he said, in response to her question. "I've actually been working on the book for a year or so now. I don't know how much interest there'll be in it once it's actually published, but if nothing else I suppose it'll be a good family heirloom. You know, a bit of family history written by someone who was actually involved in it, instead of some egghead history major analyzing events from a distance of a few decades."

Cagalli shook her head, chuckling. "I'm not sure if you really mean that, or it it's just an excuse for you to organize your own thoughts." Meeting his glowing eyes, she raised an eyebrow. "Judging from that glimpse I caught, I see you're still giving Asuka grief, if only from a few hundred kilometers away."

"He rubs me the wrong way," Kevin said honestly. "I also firmly believe he's a menace, as much to his friends as to his enemies. That temper of his could easily get him killed, probably taking several of his friends along for the ride." He reached into a jacket pocket, pulled out a cigarette, and lit up. "The thing about him," he said thoughtfully, "is that he's tied to his past to the exclusion of almost everything else. Now, I'll admit a lot of _my_ actions are tied to my past… but that's because my past is currently trying to kill me."

"That would be a good reason to worry about it," she agreed… and then her expression sobered. "So, still no word?"

He glanced away. "Not exactly," he admitted quietly. "You know, of course, that Invictus is also afflicted with Snake Eater now, as is Carter… well, now we also have some information about where the bastard responsible for it is."

"You've heard from Tolle, then?" By now, Cagalli knew the former college student had been Kevin's primary intelligence asset in space for the last several months, so he was the logical source of any new information.

"Yeah," Kevin confirmed. "The poor guy's been bouncing from place to place ever since Meer Campbell turned up, trying to be everywhere at once, but his hard work is starting to pay off. First off, I finally know where my father is."

Cagalli stiffened. "He's been located? Where?"

"Currently in transit from wherever Carter's base is right now to Orb," he answered, pulling out the cigarette and taking a deep breath of smoke. "He's taking a shuttle down as we speak, which means he must be finally ready to openly declare himself in Orb, though I rather doubt he intends to try and take over just yet." He grimaced. "Regrettably, I don't dare try and liquidate him just now. There's no guarantee even Nemesis could reach his shuttle before he gets down, and attacking him in Orb would be… difficult, to say the least. My credibility would be effectively zero from then on, and I'd be a wanted man even in Orb."

"Because we're the only ones who could corroborate your story, and we're all fugitives right now, too," Cagalli mused. "And then there's the fact that he'll soon have access to the Avalon defenses, too, right?"

"Unfortunately, yes," Kevin said with a sigh. "I expunged as many of the old command codes as I could, but some of it was hardwired into the original computer mainframe, during the Reconstruction War; not even I ever had those codes, but I know for a fact that Father _does._ Which means he has full access to, among other things, sixteen MIRV ICMBs, all equipped with nuclear warheads… and," he added grudgingly, "N-jammer cancelers, thanks to my idiocy. Not to mention that lovely cache of VX, which I never managed to destroy, and a whole lot of antique weapons that'll kill me just as dead as modern ones."

She winced. "No wonder you always thought that place was impregnable… Okay, so your father is back in power, or will be soon, and there's nothing we can do about it right now. What about ABADDON? Anything new on that front?"

"More bad news," he admitted, suddenly looking his age (which wasn't saying much, since he was only three years older than he appeared, but still unusual for him). "Tolle had a chance to swing around the dark side of the Moon… and he confirmed what I'd feared: the ABADDON laboratory is still largely intact."

"But… how?" Cagalli wondered. "You set off a nuclear bomb; there shouldn't have been anything left. Unless…" Her eyes narrowed. "Low-yield, high-radiation weapon? Enough bang to toast you and your immediate surroundings, but mostly a radiological weapon?"

"That was Tolle's guess, from what he saw," Kevin agreed. "He didn't stick around long, but his opinion is that the blast chamber was reinforced with a thin layer of DiaSteel; enough that, combined with a new type of micro-yield nuke, the actual blast effects were confined to the north pole of the station. All non-augmented personnel in the south pole would've been killed, too, but by the massive amounts of gamma rays, not the actual explosion."

"And if the physical structures and machinery were hardened against radiation, much of the facility is probably still functional," she mused. "Just… too hot for any non-augmented salvagers to get too." Her gaze sharpened. "You think ZAFT knows about this?"

"They built the place; I'm guessing they've got a good idea of how to find it," he responded obliquely. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure they know, tovarisch. And as soon as they can spare the manpower, they'll almost certainly try to reoccupy the place." A shadow came into his eyes. "And that means… I can't ignore it, either."

Cagalli reached out, and gripped his human arm. "You're going to go back there, aren't you?" she murmured.

"I have no choice," Kevin said heavily. "It's something I've avoid for over five years now… but I can't avoid it forever. Everything leads back to that place, and we _cannot_ allow ZAFT to wrest control of the facility. The Destroyers they've managed to create from Delta's systems are bad enough; what they could do if they continued Oracle's research is more frightening than I care to contemplate."

"You could just destroy it," she suggested quietly. "Use a nuke of your own to finish the job you started, six years ago…"

He shook his head. "I can't do that," he said, voice sinking to a whisper. "Leaving aside the fact that the data there might be needed to find the cure for Snake Eater, I can't do that to my comrades. Bad enough that I killed them; I won't just obliterate what remains of them. They… they at least deserve a proper burial, after everything." He closed his eyes. "And I could never forgive myself if I didn't at least go back to where it all began. My people… my _friends_ deserve that much."

Cagalli sighed, knowing there was no way to dissuade him now. She could _order_ him not to go, and expect him to obey… but she couldn't. There were dark places in Kevin Walker's soul even yet, and it seemed likely he would never truly find absolution within himself without going back there.

_He no longer thinks he's a monster,_ she mused, _but he still can't put it out of his mind… but then if he could, he wouldn't be Kevin, would he?_

"Well," she said at last, "if you think you have to do it, I won't stop you, Kevin. But," she went on, smiling suddenly, "it's not like you'll even have time to go there for a while yet, so why don't we go get some lunch?"

Kevin managed a chuckle. "Not a bad idea, tovarisch. Need to keep up my strength and all…"

Laughing, the pair departed, heading for _Archangel_'s cafeteria.

* * *

Standing on the roof of the government building where he'd stayed the night, Athrun Zala was quietly fuming. _That girl doesn't understand what she's doing,_ he thought darkly, reflecting on the events of the morning. _I really hope the Chairman knows what he's doing, because _she_ obviously doesn't…_

His morning had started off quite badly enough, right from the moment he'd awoken. Certainly the last thing he'd expected was to find Meer Campbell in his bed… and things had gone downhill from there. Before he'd even had the chance to sort _that_ out, Lunamaria had arrived at his door, asking if he wanted to join her for breakfast.

And Meer had, apparently, taken that as a threat to the façade she was maintaining, answered the door herself, and informed Luna that Athrun would be going to down to breakfast with _her,_ "Lacus Clyne"… and then, just to make her point perfectly understood, she'd shut the door in Luna's face.

Athrun had not been the least amused, to put it mildly.

"_Just what do you think you're doing?" Athrun demanded. "You realize the impression you just gave her? And what were you doing in my bed in the first place?"_

_Meer shrugged, unabashed. "I'm supposed to be your fiancé, right? That's what a fiancé would do; and a fiancé wouldn't have any problem letting other people know how things stand."_

"_Except that the real Lacus Clyne would _never_ do such a thing," he retorted, pulling on his uniform. "She's not like that; and I don't remember Chairman Durandal saying anything about acting like Lacus and I were still engaged anyway."_

"_I _am_ supposed to be Lacus Clyne," she pointed out. "It was never made public that the engagement between you two was broken off, so of course we have to maintain the appearance, right? Otherwise…"_

"_Just because it wasn't made public then doesn't mean it couldn't be now," Athrun told her irritably, fastening his collar. "It's known I was in Orb for two years; a lot of things can happen in that time… and 'maintaining the appearance' is already making my working relationships on the _Minerva_ more difficult."_

_Meer sighed. "Perhaps that is so, Athrun, but it really is better this way. I'm sure you can work around it, and it _does_ provide more evidence that I really am Lacus, doesn't it? I'm sure the Chairman knew these issues were going to come up, so you could always talk to him, if you need help…"_

_Athrun took a deep breath, and chose another approach. _I need to get through to her _somehow,__he told himself. _I don't want this happening again… _"Look, Meer, you're playing a very dangerous game here. Do you have any idea the risks you're taking with all this?"_

_She looked at him blankly. "Risks? What risks? The only people who are the wiser about this are you, Chairman Durandal, and the _Archangel;_ and since Lacus herself hasn't come forward to protest, I don't think-"_

"_I'm not talking about Lacus," he interrupted. "I'm talking about Kevin. Look, you've never met him, so maybe you don't understand this, but Kevin is _very_ protective of his family, and he's already angry about what you're doing. He told me himself that the only reason he hasn't exposed you is because he thinks of you as bait."_

_Meer blinked. "Bait?"_

_Athrun sighed. _And people think the real Lacus is naïve,_ he though wearily. "Meer, Kevin is one of my best friends, but I'm not blind to his faults, or his ruthlessness. He tolerates you only because your act distracts any who would mean Lacus harm from the real one; if it weren't for that, he would've gone public from Day One. As it is, he wouldn't hesitate to assassinate you if you stepped a centimeter over the line."_

"_You're joking," she said dismissively. "I know Colonel Walker's reputation. He's ruthless against his enemies, but he wouldn't go after someone like me. Not even he would dare cross that line."_

"_He would if he thought you were going too far," he replied bluntly. "Like I said, he's very protective of his family. If he thought your actions were putting his sister at risk, he would either hunt you down himself or send one of his very loyal subordinates after you. And let me warn you," he added, nodding significantly at the bed, "the actions you're starting to take are right in the direction he would consider most threatening."_

Meer had, at last, apparently understood that Athrun was being quite serious about Kevin's likely reaction, but it had given him a headache anyway. "Doesn't help that I had to bring up Kevin like that," he muttered to himself. "First time I was actually _glad_ of how he is…"

"Rough morning, Commander?"

Athrun nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of the voice, which came from less than two meters to his right. Alec King had seemingly materialized out of thin air, and was now leaning against the railing, looking out over Diocuia. "You're just like Kevin," he remarked, when his heartbeat had returned to normal. "And you don't have to call me Commander right now, Alexander; we're off-duty, and out of earshot."

"True," Alec conceded. "In that case, I'm Alec." He smiled faintly. "I'm assuming whatever happened with your morning was also responsible for Luna's bad mood at breakfast?"

The blue-haired pilot grimaced. "Yeah, you could say that… How much do you know about what's going on, by the way?"

"If you mean, do I know that the 'Lacus Clyne' you've been walking around with is a fake," the Destroyer said calmly, "then the answer is yes. I'm well aware that the real Lacus Clyne is neither a hyper-active tart nor anywhere near Diocuia."

"Somehow I'm not surprised," Athrun murmured. "Did Kevin tell you?"

"Not directly… but I have my sources." Alec glanced sidelong at the pilot. "Suffice it to say, Athrun, that we few who survive like to keep in touch." He raised an eyebrow. "Am I to assume, then, that this imposter was responsible for your rotten morning?"

"You could say that," Athrun said again. "You ever wake up with someone else in the bed? Someone who spends the first few minutes of the day making your working relationships harder to maintain, without realizing she's making things worse?"

"Can't say that I have," Basilisk admitted. "But, unfortunately, your news doesn't surprise me. I knew just from watching that concert yesterday that she has no idea how the real Lacus _actually_ acts." He shook his head. "Does that girl have any idea that she's playing with fire? I don't like to think of how a certain mutual acquaintance of ours would react if he heard about it."

"Very badly," Athrun said with a sigh. "I tried to warn her that she's literally endangering her own life the more steps she takes in that direction, but I'm not sure if I got through to her… and even if I did, it didn't really help me with the others."

"Probably inevitable," Alec opined. "You're a close friend of a man Luna and Shinn both despise; that's going to make it all the harder to fix any damage that imposter causes."

"Tell me about it," the pilot agreed, remembering what had happened after he and Meer had finally joined the others.

"_You must be feeling pretty good," Luna remarked to Shinn, her mood having recovered somewhat from the deliberate insult she'd received earlier. "I mean, being complimented by Chairman Durandal himself, and then getting the day off…"_

_Shinn shrugged uncomfortably. "Yeah, kinda," he conceded. "I admit, though, that I was kind of nervous, meeting with the Chairman in such a private setting. Not many pilots have that chance, you know?"_

"_Yeah, I guess so," she agreed. "Quite the honor, huh?"_

_The two of them were in the building's dining room, waiting for –among others- Athrun and "Lacus" to arrive. Had Shinn not been there, of course, Luna would still have been fuming, but for once they were having a mutual calming influence on each other._

_They both turned at the sound of footsteps, but rather than Athrun and his companion, it was Heine Westenfluss entering the room. "Good morning," he greeted cheerfully. "Good to see both of you."_

"_Good morning, Mister Westenfluss," Luna said in return, starting to salute._

_Heine laughed, and waved a hand. "Please, no need to be so formal. Just Heine will do; we're all shipmates, right?" Smiling, he glanced around the room. "Say, do either of you happen to know where Athrun is?"_

_Luna's expression clouded, remembering her reception earlier, but the sound of more approaching feet interrupted her before she could even open her mouth. This time, it _was_ Athrun… with "Lacus" on his arm. Although, Luna noted, he did seem somewhat uncomfortable with the arrangement…_

"_Right here," Athrun said, in reply to Heine's question. "Good morning, all of you."_

"_Good morning, Athrun; or do you prefer Commander Zala?" Heine asked politely._

"_Athrun will do," the other pilot replied._

"_Ah. In that case…" The blonde pilot turned his attention to Athrun's companion. "Good morning, Miss Lacus," he greeted. "It's an honor to meet you."_

_Meer smiled brightly. "Why, thank you, Mister Westenfluss. A pleasure it is to meet you, as well; I understand you've worked as hard as anyone in defending the PLANTs."_

"_I'm just one man, trying to do my part," Heine said modestly. "I should be thanking _you,_ Miss Lacus, for your performance yesterday. It was inspiring for us all, I think."_

_As Meer accepted the other FAITH member's compliments, Athrun gritted his teeth. _If Kevin could hear the praise being lavished on Meer,_ he thought to himself, _by people who think _she's_ the real Lacus, he'd probably kill everyone in the room through sheer anger…

_His was given a reprieve from his irritation soon enough, though, as one of Meer's aides entered. "Excuse me, Miss Lacus," he said politely, "but it's just about time for your meeting…"_

_She nodded, still smiling. "Thank you, I'll be right there." Turning back to Heine, she essayed a curtsey. "I'm afraid I have a bit of business to attend to, Mister Westenfluss. It's been a pleasure meeting you; perhaps we'll see each other later, as well."_

"_I would be honored, Miss Lacus."_

_As the imposter stepped out, Athrun allowed himself an inward sigh of relief. _Maybe now I can manage a bit of damage control…

"_Well," Heine remarked, "she's quite the personable sort, isn't she?" Not waiting for any sort of reply, he turned to Shinn. "So, you'd be the pilot of the Impulse, right? How does it perform in battle? I've heard that it's made the difference in several of _Minerva_'s battles already."_

"_So far, it's performed even better in battle than in training," Shinn replied, quickly warming to the affable FAITH member. "The new power transmission system helped out when we escaping from Orb, and the modular nature of the unit's been a lifesaver."_

_Heine nodded thoughtfully. "I'd heard there were some structural integrity issues with it, but it sounds like the advantages have so far outweighed the risks…" He looked over at Luna. "And you're flying a ZAKU Warrior, eh? I flew a Phantom myself, during the abortive offensive against the PLANTs that kicked off the war. The ZAKU series is still an excellent design, even with the new GOUFs coming online; I understand you've used it to great effect in defending _Minerva."

"_I'm okay with it," Luna acknowledged with a shrug. "It's not as good in atmosphere, since it can't fly, but I like to think my fire support has been helpful."_

"_I'm sure it has," he assured her, and turned his attention back to Athrun. "So, you've got the last Second-Stage unit, right? The Savior?"_

"_That's right," Athrun confirmed. "I haven't had much of a chance to test it in battle yet –my abortive attempt to rendezvous with _Minerva_ in Orb was mostly just dodging enemy fire- but it worked out well during the Lohengrin Gate battle. Kind of reminds me of my old Aegis, really, except more maneuverable in atmosphere."_

_Heine nodded. "Well, it sounds like _Minerva_ is in good hands already, with you three –and that Za Burrel fellow- flying off her. Not to mention, of course, the weapons of the ship herself; I daresay only an _Archangel_-class could rival her." He smiled, shaking his head. "Frankly, I'm not quite sure why _three_ FAITH members would even be needed on that ship, since you people already have things well in hand."_

"_We could always use more pilots," Athrun pointed out, echoing his words from the previous day. "I may have good pilots working with me, but we can only be in so many places at once. Quality sometimes isn't enough to make up for a lack of quantity."_

"_True enough," the other pilot conceded. "Well, regardless of the Chairman's exact plans for assigning me to your ship, I know he has high expectations for us all. I hope to be able to fulfill them…"_

"I'll say this for Heine Westenfluss," Alec mused, after Athrun had related the morning's events. "You don't want to be on the wrong side of his beam rifle, but if you're on his side, he's just about the nicest guy you'll ever meet. Doesn't have a malicious bone in his body, as far as I can tell."

Athrun raised an eyebrow. "You've worked with him before?"

"Yeah," the Destroyer confirmed. "I was crew chief on the Experimental Firearms GuAIZ he flew at Second Jachin, so I got to know him fairly well back then… though, of course, he had no idea about my true identity."

"Well, that about matches my impression of him," Athrun admitted. "Meer's been causing me problems working with Luna, and Shinn just plain doesn't like me, but I don't think I'll have any trouble dealing with Heine. Kind of a nice change, really."

"Yeah," Alec agreed, "it's always nice to work with people you can get along with." A shadow crossed his expression, as memories flitted through his mind. "That's how things were when my old unit was together… except that none of us really cared for the science types."

"So I understand," the blue-haired pilot remarked. "Kevin once told me that you guys would only take orders through him, and his exec…" He trailed off. "Sorry."

Basilisk waved a hand. "It's an old wound, Athrun," he said quietly. "I can't help thinking about it when I'm around Kevin, but I've learned to live with it otherwise. At any rate," he went on more naturally, "you're right about that. Even as a brainwashed puppet Kevin had a fair amount of backbone, so we all knew that if orders came through that were brilliantly idiotic, he'd fight them off before they ever got to us; any orders he passed on were ones that made sense. Fortunately," he continued, with a slight grimace, "none of us had much contact with Medical Section. Even before I found out what they'd done to Kevin, I found Oracle's medical types creepy. Actually, they made my flesh crawl; it always felt like I was dealing with clones of Doctor Frankenstein or something."

"Probably not too far from the truth," Athrun murmured, "judging from what little Kevin's said about the whole affair… Well, I can't say the rest of the morning was much better, but at least it didn't get any _worse_ after Heine arrived… I think."

_After taking their leave of Heine –who still had business of his own before reporting to the _Minerva_- the other three pilots made their way toward the elevator, intending to return to the building's lobby._

"_Hmm…" Luna mused, almost to herself. "A day off, but I'm not really sure what to do…" She glanced over at her companions. "Actually, going into town for the day sounds kind of nice, but I don't really feel like going alone…"_

_She was looking straight at Athrun as she spoke, and he sighed inwardly. _What did I do to deserve this?_ he wondered, resigned. _All I want to do is help defend the PLANTs again; I didn't sign up again for _this._

_Deciding not to take the hint, Athrun simply shrugged. "If you'd rather not be alone, why not go with Shinn?"_

_Shinn, not at all certain he wanted to get into the discussion at all, kept his peace as they reached and entered the elevator, but Luna's eyes flashed at her commander's words. _He's perfectly willing to put up with that tart, but he brushes _me_ off without a second thought?

_Noticing her obvious anger, Athrun closed his eyes for a moment. "Maybe I should just go back to the ship," he offered, trying –and mostly succeeding- to keep his own irritation out of his voice. "It looks like I might just be in the way out here…"_

"_You probably don't need the time off anyway," Luna said sarcastically. "I'm sure you're nice and 'relaxed' after your night with Miss Lacus."_

I think I'll just stay out of this one completely,_ Shinn thought to himself, seeing genuine anger flare in Athrun's eyes. _No sense looking for trouble…

_The elevator ride was mercifully short, and Shinn slipped out unobtrusively at his first opportunity. In this issue, he wasn't really sure whose side he was on, and did _not_ want to be caught in the middle. He'd rather be facing Nemesis just then…_

_After Shinn departed, Athrun caught Luna's eye, and gestured curtly for her to follow him to a corner of the lobby. He'd understood _exactly_ what she was implying with her last remark, and he wasn't sure if he was more irritated with her or with Meer._

"_So," Luna said coldly, when they were out of earshot of others, "do you slap women, too?" At Athrun's brief blank look, she gestured off toward where Shinn had disappeared. "Shinn told me about what you did after that battle in the Indian Ocean, Commander."_

_Athrun's eyes were hard and unflinching. "Shinn was totally out of line," he said flatly. "He disobeyed direct orders twice, and exhibited an intolerable level of insubordination prejudicial to discipline and the success of the mission. I'm not a 'By the Book' commander, Luna, but what he did was completely unacceptable."_

"_Which resulted in you asking Walker for help," she said with a snort. "He's not even an ally, you know. Technically, there are shoot on sight orders out for him."_

"_Orders that will never be carried out under the current conditions," he countered. "I brought Kevin into the matter because I had no other choice. Shinn was refusing to return despite my direct orders, and none of our own units were in a position to intervene. Nor, for that matter, is it certain they could've done anything anyway. Kevin could and did, end of story."_

"_And promptly finished the work Shinn started," Luna pointed out. "You might as well have just let him-"_

"_Kevin is a free agent, not bound by ZAFT authority," Athrun said levelly. "What he does is his business, not mine. Shinn, on the other hand, had been ordered by his direct superior to break off his attack and return to base. _That_ is the difference between their actions." He lowered his voice. "And as for this morning, you completely misunderstood what was going on."_

_She snorted. "Did I? Seemed clear enough to me, Commander." She turned to leave… but Athrun caught her arm before she could._

"_Your attitude isn't helping," he said quietly. "And for your information, Lacus Clyne is a close relative of Kevin Walker. Do you really think someone that close to _him_ would act in the manner you're suggesting?"_

_Luna blinked, taken aback by the suggestion… but her eyes quickly narrowed again. "Maybe not," she conceded. "But then, Walker isn't around to keep an eye on her, now is he?" Glowering a moment longer, she abruptly spun on her heel, and left._

"Temperamental girl," Alec mused, gazing up at the sky. "Not quite what I expected, I'll admit; Erica was a bit more laidback than that… and I seem to remember her saying her sisters were much the same." He shrugged. "Of course, that _was_ six years ago. Even Luna would've been only about eleven back then; people change a lot in that stage of life. And… losing Erica probably didn't help any."

Athrun nodded somberly. "I know what losing your sister did to Kevin," he said quietly. "I didn't run into him until years after the fact, but even as of the war he was still pretty messed up. He hated ZAFT badly enough he tried very hard to kill me on several occasions." He winced. "He very nearly succeeded once; only Cagalli's direct intervention stopped him."

"That doesn't surprise me," Basilisk informed him, turning around to lean back against the railing. "It's a part of us all: the utter inability to give up… and the utter unwillingness to set aside an objective without direct orders. The former quality was inherent in anyone chosen to be augmented; the latter seems to have been conditioned into us." He shook his head. "Even now, I don't really know all the details of what Medical Section and Delta 'programmed' into us."

"Somehow I'm not surprised… Too bad I can't get Luna to understand that." Athrun sighed. "She just doesn't understand what really went on six years ago… and she won't listen to me when I try to tell her what's going on with Meer."

"Under orders not to say a word about it, hm?" Alec said, raising an eyebrow.

"Unfortunately," the pilot confirmed. "I don't agree with the Chairman's methods, and I don't like having to deal with the girl… but revealing it now would just serve to undermine Chairman Durandal during a time when the last thing we need is a popular distrust of the government. If we don't stand united, we'll fall to the Earth Forces' numbers."

The Destroyer's expression darkened. "Chairman Durandal is making a serious mistake by using Campbell," he opined quietly. "He ought to know that if the truth gets out, it'll cause more problems than the deception prevented in the first place. And what happens then? Delta's people will stand behind him, I'm sure, but they can't win a war all by themselves; and while the exposure of that deception might not actually bring down the government, it _would_ shake trust in the Supreme Council's leadership."

"I'm fairly sure Arkanian already knows," Athrun agreed, "given her, ah, 'discussions' with Kevin; so you're probably right about her supporting him to the end. But-"

Alec interrupted him with an abruptly raised hand. "Someone's coming," he muttered, eyes closed as he concentrated on the data from his implant systems. "No implant signature, fortunately; the last thing I need is for Delta to come here and meet me…" He frowned. "Meyrin…?"

Both turned their attention to the door leading back into the building, and so were in a position to see it open moments later, revealing Meyrin Hawke. "Uh, hi," she greeted uncertainly, surprised to see the man she knew as "Kyle Alexander" on the roof. "Sorry if I'm interrupting anything, but I ran into Luna a few minutes ago, and she seemed to be in kind of a bad mood…"

Athrun sighed. "Tell me about it."

"Your fearless mobile suit commander has had a rough morning," Alec explained, clapping the pilot on the shoulder with carefully measured strength. "Seems Miss Lacus Clyne managed to embarrass him rather badly in front of your sister."

Meyrin's eyes widened. "Miss Lacus? But… why? What would _she_ have done that could make Luna that mad…?"

Athrun hesitated for a moment, on the verge of explaining what was really going on… and finally made an internal decision. _Fine, then. She's been more sympathetic than her sister lately… and I somehow think she knows how to keep a secret._

"She did something that angered Luna… because she isn't Lacus Clyne at all, Meyrin," he said quietly. "It's… kind of a long story…"

* * *

"…so that's how it is," Athrun concluded. "It's not a good idea for you to tell anyone else, though, under the circumstances."

Meyrin nodded slowly, eyes wide. "A fake Lacus to calm down the people… I never would've suspected she wasn't the real thing." She tilted her head. "But… why tell me, Commander? If it's so secret… I mean, even if you disagree with the Chairman in the first place, should you be saying anything about this?"

"Probably not," he admitted. "But… well, to be honest, it felt good to tell _someone_ what really went on this morning. Your sister… misinterpreted things, and isn't exactly happy with me right now." He grimaced. "I wish I could tell _her_ what really happened, but after all the grief she's given me about Kevin, it doesn't seem like a real good idea."

"Yeah," she murmured. "Well, I guess I shouldn't say anything to her, either." She shook her head. "This is just… well, weird, really. I can understand why Chairman Durandal is doing this, but at the same time… I'm not really sure what to think of it."

Alec, heretofore having remained mostly silent, snorted quietly. "You make up your own mind, Meyrin. I won't tell you what to think; that would be far too much like what was done to the twelve of us, six years ago."

Meyrin's gaze snapped over to the Destroyer. "Six years ago?" she repeated. "Mister Alexander, what are you…?"

He pushed away from the railing. "This is something that can never be spoken of aboard _Minerva,"_ he warned, "if only because of one Natalya Ivanova Arkanian. However, I believe that you, at least –not sure about Luna, given her… issues- deserve to know a certain fact. My name is not Kyle Alexander. My name is Alec King… codename Basilisk." Alec met the young woman's eyes, a serious look in his own gaze.

"Your elder sister was a very good friend of mine, once upon a time."

She gasped. "You're… you're a survivor of the ABADDON project? But… why have you been hiding all this time…?"

"For the same reason most of the other old members are, I think," Alec replied. "Fear of discovery. It's unlikely any of us would've been greeted warmly by the rest of ZAFT until recently… and I doubt any of us would be inclined to have anything to do with Delta's new unit." He shrugged. "In my case… well, I was still loyal to ZAFT, and I still wanted to help out, but I wanted to put the specter of ABADDON behind me, so I reenlisted under a new name several years ago."

"That explains some things," Meyrin said softly, almost to herself. "But why… are you telling _me?"_

Basilisk shrugged again. "Because I think you can keep a secret… and because I thought you should know that, if you ever need assistance, you can call on your sister's old comrade." With a courteous nod, he turned, strode past her, and slipped back into the building.

Meyrin watched him go, a perplexed expression on her face. "Lacus Clyne an imposter, and one of Erica's friends turning up alive," she murmured. "Everything keeps getting stranger every day…"

"Nothing is as it seems right now," Athrun agreed quietly. "These days, it's starting to seem almost like every loose end from the last twenty years is approaching resolution… I mean, the ABADDON Project, Kevin's father…" He shook his head. "Combine that with the war that's going on, and the Chairman's use of a fake Lacus to keep the people calm, and I really don't know where everything will go from here."

"I know what you mean," Meyrin concurred. "But I guess… all we can is all we can do, right? We just have to keep going, no matter what."

He sighed. "Yeah, you're probably right about that…" _I just hope that the path we're traveling on… doesn't lead to the kind of battles I fear it might.  
_

* * *

Enjoying the afternoon breeze, Shinn Asuka raced down a road on the outskirts of Diocuia, riding a motorcycle toward the sea. After the strange and tense events of the morning, he'd chosen to spend his day off as far away from _Minerva_'s crew as he could. Most especially, he didn't want to be anywhere near in the event of Athrun and Luna running into each other again.

_I'm not a big fan of the commander,_ he thought, easing around a bend in the road, _but I'm not getting in the middle of _that_ on either side. It's not my business, and I really don't want anything to do with it…_

Ordinarily, he very likely would've simply sided with Luna. Under the circumstances, though, he figured it was a topic he had no business getting anywhere near.

So it was that Shinn found himself heading for the sea, where he thought he might find some calm. Even now, his few memories unclouded by the deaths of his parents and sister reminded him that he'd once found solace in the ocean, during his childhood in Orb. In this place, so far from the shores where his family had perished, perhaps he could find that peace again…

_It's weird,_ he thought, guiding the sleek vehicle toward the sea. _So many things have happened since that day… I haven't found vengeance yet, but so much else… And if Chairman Durandal's right, then the people who brought that conflict to Orb in the first place are still around. So there's a danger that what happened then…might happen again…_

That Durandal was placing trust in one Shinn Asuka to help stop that from happening filled the young pilot with pride; it also, however, made him acutely aware of how much was riding on him and his fellow pilots. _Minerva_ was at the forefront of the new conflict, that was clear. Durandal had chosen the ship and her pilots to be the vanguard, the sword and shield of ZAFT as they fought to stop the new war before it could escalate to the terrible heights of the old.

_But one day,_ Shinn thought to himself, _it won't just be the Earth Forces we're fighting, will it? After what happened to us when we were leaving Orb… we're going to have go back there, aren't we? They're collaborating with the Earth Alliance and Logos now, after all…_

The thought didn't bother him as much as it once might've. His ties to Orb had been effectively severed the day he chose to enlist in ZAFT… and he was beginning to shed his doubts about his own skill in the cockpit. He'd performed well in his first few battles, won the day in the escape from Orb –despite heavy damage to his own machine- and fought admirably since then… despite the meddling of the Nemesis in one encounter.

No, Shinn no longer doubted he could succeed against Orb units if he had to… and the thought of engaging Nemesis in the process was one he savored, as he made his way toward the sea.

Hours after leaving _Minerva_ and Diocuia behind, Shinn finally pulled over near a cliff, overlooking the Black Sea. Swinging himself off the motorcycle, he turned his gaze seaward… and then froze, seeing someone already standing on the cliff.

Or, more precisely, the blonde-haired young woman was dancing near the cliff's edge, wearing a white and blue dress. She was twirling this way and that, eyes closed, seemingly without a care in the world… and Shinn found himself captivated.

_Have I seen her before?_ he wondered, watching the young woman dance, oblivious to the world. _She looks… familiar. And that dance…_

He was quickly too caught up in the girl's dance to think very clearly, and soon lost all sense of time. How long he stood there, Shinn himself would never know. He only knew something about the young woman had his attention, to the exclusion of all else, and he was no more aware of the outside world than she.

Until the moment a dance step took her too far, and the girl tumbled almost gracefully off the cliff.

Shocked by the sudden event, Shinn could only stand there for a moment, staring blankly at the space the girl had just occupied. Then his brain kicked in again, and he broke into a run toward the edge of the cliff. _I have to do something!_

The pilot didn't really pause to think about what he was doing. Acting on pure instinct, he tore off his jacket, yanked his shoes off, and then took a flying leap off the cliff, heedless of the very drop that might've already killed the person he was trying to save.

It was fortunate there were no rocks at the base of the cliff; if there had been, Shinn's impulsive leap would've cost him his life. As it was, he plunged easily into the water, in a landing that would've made any professional swimmer proud, under other circumstances.

Glancing around wildly, trying to find the girl, Shinn pumped his arms and legs as hard as he could, swimming deeper beneath the surface. _I have to find her,_ he thought, lungs already straining under the abuse. _She could drown if I don't hurry!_

Then he caught sight of her, mere meters away… and unlike him, she clearly wasn't prepared for the situation. She was panicking, struggling in an attempt to both reach the surface and try to get some air into her lungs… and succeeding at neither.

With renewed determination, Shinn swam over to her, getting within arm's reach of the girl in moments. When he grabbed her shoulders, though, her wide, panicked eyes focused him, and she started to struggle against his grip.

Gritting his teeth –and trying to ignore his near-bursting lungs- Shinn held on despite her struggles, kicking toward the surface. _Doesn't she realize I'm trying to help? We'll _both_ drown if she keeps this up!_

Despite the girl's struggles, he managed to haul them both to the surface in moments, breaking free of the water with a profound sense of relief. Maintaining his grip on the girl's shoulders, Shinn gasped for breath, replenishing the oxygen expended in the brief but draining underwater struggle… and then recall the hard way that the girl was struggling. Now freed to breathe herself, her struggles increased, her hands flailing to scratch at him.

"Hey!" he protested. "Calm down! I'm trying to help, okay?" He winced, trying to hold her in place, as her fingernails opened a shallow cut on his face. "Calm down!"

"I… I…!" The girl stared at him wildly for several seconds… and then, finally, her struggles slowed, and then stopped entirely. "I…"

Allowing himself an inward sigh of relief, Shinn smiled reassuringly at the girl, then began pulling her along to the nearest accessible shore. Their dive into the water had occurred at an inconvenient spot; the cliff was sheer all the way to the water, with no place to come ashore in sight, save only for a small beach leading directly into a cave.

It was with no small relief that Shinn got himself and his companion onto something resembling dry land. _That's not something I'd like to do again,_ he thought. _We both could've drowned out there…_

Standing now on the sand, Shinn turned to the girl, and voiced the obvious question. "Just what were you doing out there, anyway?" he asked. "Falling off the cliff was bad enough, but struggling when I tried to save you… Did you _want_ to die after all that?"

Her reaction startled him. At the mention of the word "die", the girl's eyes went wide, her face paled, and her breathing caught. "Die…?" she whispered, starting to tremble. "No… No! I don't want to die!" With a look of utter panic, she turned away, and ran back into the water.

Shinn blinked, confused. "Hey, wait!" _What's she doing now? She'll just start drowning again if she does that!_ Unnerved by the girl's reaction, he quickly followed after her, catching her by the shoulder before she could get far. "Wait a second! What are you-?"

"I don't want to die!" she repeated, almost sobbing. "I can't die, I don't want to die…!" She started struggling again, much as she had when Shinn first pulled her out of the water.

This time, though, he was better prepared for it, holding her shoulders tightly in spite of her efforts to get away. "Calm down," he said, voice soothing instead of commanding this time. "It's all right. You're not going to die, okay? You're going to be just fine." He paused for a moment, recalling his first sight of her on the cliff. "You're not going to die… because I'm going to protect you."

Her struggles continued unabated for several moments… but then Shinn's words penetrated the panic in the girl's mind. _I'm… not going to die?_ she thought, hesitating. _Everything's okay… because he'll be there?_

Slowly, her tense muscles began to relax, and she looked up at the pilot's face. "I'm… not going to die?" she whispered.

Shinn smiled. "No, you're not. I'll protect you." _And the strange thing is… I really mean that. I haven't felt this way since…_ His mind shied away from the memory. "Are you okay now?"

The girl slowly nodded, trembling a little in the aftermath of the emotional outburst. "Yes… thank you…"

"That's good." Carefully releasing her shoulders, Shinn turned, glancing about the area they'd found themselves in. "Huh…" he said, almost to himself. "A cave… well, at least there's shelter."

Daring to step back from the girl, now that her hysterics had ceased, he walked back to the cave entrance, and then moved down one end of the small beach, frowning to himself. _Hm…_ Pacing first to one end, then to the other, he finally went back to the cave, and took a look inside.

Observing the pilot's actions with a certain amount of confusion, the girl tilted her head. "Is… something wrong?" she asked hesitantly.

Shinn stepped back out of the cave. "Not really," he said, sighing. "It's just… there doesn't seem to be any way out of this place. Not without a long swim, anyway, and I don't think either of us is up to that right now."

The girl blinked. "Then… we're stranded here?"

"Not necessarily," he said slowly, and reached into his right hip pocket. "This thing should be waterproof, so I can at least send a signal…" Withdrawing a small locator beacon –which he'd brought with him mostly out of habit, rather than any expectation of needing it- he examined it for a moment, making sure that the trip through the water hadn't fried it, then triggered it. "There. It might be a few hours, but my friends will be able to find us now."

"So everything will be okay, then?" the girl questioned.

Shinn smiled again. "Of course it will be. I said I'd protect you, didn't I?" Glancing back into the cave again, he nodded to himself. "And in the meantime, there seems to be enough wood around for me to build a fire and at least dry us off."

_After all, it just wouldn't be right to survive that crazy jump, and the near-drowning, only to die of hypothermia while waiting for a ride…  
_

* * *

A few minutes later, the two of them huddled in front of a fire, warming up and drying off through the aid of its warmth. The plunge into the water had left them both cold and soaked, making the fire very welcome indeed.

Once the fire was lit, Shinn had time to take stock of the situation, as well as carefully tend a small cut the girl had received during the struggle, binding it gently with a handkerchief that had survived the plunge relatively dry.

It also gave Shinn time to voice some of the questions that had been going through his mind ever since they took the plunge off the cliff. They'd been too busy trying to stay alive before, but now there was little to do but talk, until rescue finally arrived.

"So…" he began hesitantly, "can I ask your name? I'm Shinn."

"Stellar," the girl replied readily, gazing into the fire. "I'm Stellar."

Shinn nodded. _At least now I know what to call her._ "That's a nice name." He tilted his head. "Where are you from, Stellar?"

"I don't remember," Stellar admitted; she didn't seem very perturbed by the fact. "I haven't been there in a long time…"

"I haven't been 'home' much, either," Shinn mused. "So many things happened… but that doesn't really matter right now." He scratched his head. "So, if you don't remember where you're from, who do you usually spend your time with?"

She brightened. "Usually with Neo, Sting, and Auel," she answered, with a small smile. "They've taken care of me as long as I can remember…"

Shinn nodded to himself. _It must be nice, to have friends you can rely on like that… but that's why I joined ZAFT, isn't it? So that I could be one of those that other people can rely on…_

"Shinn?" Stellar said, speaking up tentatively.

He looked up. "Yeah, Stellar?"

"You said… you were going to protect me." Her wide, vulnerable eyes met his own, seeming to gaze into his very soul. "Do you mean that?"

"Of course I do," Shinn assured her. "No matter what, I'll protect you, Stellar."

Stellar smiled then, and stood. "Um… here," she said, holding out a small seashell. "I… want you to have this."

Blinking, Shinn took the shell, blushing a little. "Uh… thank you," he managed, turning his gaze to the small shell. _There's something about this girl…_

Noticing the redness in Shinn's face, Stellar tilted her head. "Is something wrong?"

He quickly shook his head. "No, not at all," he assured her. "There's nothing wrong at all." _And for the first time in a long while… that's actually true…  
_

* * *

Hours later, Athrun Zala approached the rocky shore in a small boat. After _Minerva_ received the signal from Shinn's beacon, he'd gone out to retrieve the pilot, and now he shook his head in bemusement. _How did he get into this predicament?_ he wondered. _And why does this remind me of when I first met Cagalli?_

To his surprise, it wasn't just Shinn waiting for him when he drew up beside the beach, and he frowned in puzzlement. _I wonder who _she_ is? And does she have something to do with him being here in the first place? …I _knew_ this reminded me of that time in the Indian Ocean…_

"I'm glad you finally got here," Shinn remarked, mildly surprised that he actually meant it. "Mind giving us a lift, Commander?"

"That _is_ why I'm here," Athrun replied dryly, gesturing for the pilot and his companion to come aboard. "I have to wonder, though: how on earth can you possibly have an emergency on your day off? Don't you have enough trouble on duty without going looking for it in your off hours?"

Helping Stellar into the boat, Shinn sighed. "It wasn't exactly my idea, Commander," he explained, and lowered his voice. "She fell off the cliff when I was passing by, I jumped in after her, and that's pretty much it. It isn't my fault we ended up stranded." He glanced briefly at Stellar. "She… seems confused about a lot of things. I'm not really surprised she fell in, really."

"Hm…" Athrun nodded thoughtfully, guiding the boat back to open water. _In other words, she got confused –or distracted- and fell in because she wasn't paying close enough attention,_ he thought. _And then you decided to play the hero by jumping in after her… Well, at least I can't fault your courage, or your altruism._

He snorted mentally. _This time, anyway.  
_

* * *

Hours after Shinn Asuka had taken the seaside route, a car drove along the same course he'd used… one carrying the other two Extendeds, Sting Oakley and Auel Neider.

"I wonder what happened to her _this_ time," Sting muttered, steering the car along the cliffside road. "Man, that girl… she's always getting herself lost. Does she have to walk around in a daze _all_ the time, you think?"

"At least she doesn't do it in battle," Auel replied, keeping his eyes on their surroundings. "She might go a little nuts in combat, but she keeps her mind on the mission. If that means she daydreams off-duty, I can live with it."

Sting sighed. "I guess… but I still wish we didn't have to be out here looking for her like this."

"No argument there… Wait a second." Auel frowned, catching sight of a vehicle coming toward them. A ZAFT jeep, it looked like… and in one of the seats… "That's Stellar!"

At the same moment, Stellar caught sight of them, and seconds later both vehicles slowed to a stop. "Auel!" Stellar called, starting to climb out of the ZAFT jeep. "Sting!"

"About time you turned up," Sting told her, waving her over. He then turned his attention to the two men with her. "What happened, anyway?"

"She fell off a cliff," Shinn explained, motioning at the precipice to one side of the road. "I had to pull her out of the sea; we only just managed to get back."

Stellar nodded in confirmation. "He saved me," she said simply.

"Huh." The green-haired youth looked the ZAFT pilot over, and then nodded grudgingly. "Thanks."

Behind Shinn, Athrun cleared his throat. "Shinn, we need to get going," he pointed out. "It's getting late."

Shinn nodded reluctantly. "…Right." _And he _is_ right… but I don't have to like it._

Stellar turned back to him, a trace of sadness in her eyes. "You're leaving, then?" she said quietly.

He smiled at her. "I have to go, yes… but we'll meet again sometime. I promise we'll see each other again, okay?"

She nodded back. "Okay!"

The two rejoined their respective comrades, and headed off in two different directions… but Shinn vowed to himself that he would fulfill his promise. Something about Stellar captivated him, and he _would_ keep his promise to her.

_No matter what, Stellar, I'll see you again… and I'll protect you, like I promised._

The two parted with optimism in their hearts… completely unaware that they were mortal enemies.

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

With _Minerva_ safe in Diocuia, her crew has had time to recover, in preparation for their next mission… but as they rest, new tensions begin to rise between members of the crew, while long-held secrets begin to come to light…

Meanwhile, on Earth, Shinn Asuka develops a connection with someone who is also one of his deadliest enemies…

Okay, I am well aware that this chapter is almost certainly below my usual standard, and for that I apologize. Unfortunately, I happened to loathe just about everything going on, which makes it somewhat difficult to pull it off with my customary skill. I will note, however, that this is the only episode in the entire series that is likely to have that effect, so this shouldn't be happening again.

On a minor note, I may be posting another little project in the near future, related to another of my stories in this section; I can't make any promises, since I've no idea yet whether it will actually get anywhere, but if it does, you may find it interesting.

In the meantime, however, please let me know just how bad this chapter was. –Solid Shark


	22. Chapter 22: Opening Moves

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk**

* * *

"_In the long years I've been a soldier –all my adult life so far, and my childhood from age thirteen onward- I've seen a lot of terrible things. I've experienced a lot of terrible things, too… and I've committed more than my share of terrible things along the way._

"_As a child, studying in the lunar city Copernicus, I learned of the massive bloodletting of the Reconstruction War, and the bloody wars of the twentieth century before it; as a zoanthrope, I know of the hidden conflict in the early twenty-first century between our kind and humanity, and amongst ourselves. All this history left quite the impression on me, as I began to form my own opinions of war and how it should be fought… and then I learned firsthand the extremes to which men will go in the pursuit of the ultimate soldier._

"_As Hydra, the twelfth –and, in theory, final- product of the ABADDON program, I experienced agonizing torture, and horrific experiments, as Jeffrey Harris and his mad geneticists and cyberneticists began where my father's genetic engineering had left off, and took my combat potential to a level far beyond any human… and, in so doing, made me into something else, for while we Destroyers may be mortal men and women, we are _not_ human._

"_The pain and horror of that time remains with me yet… as does the grief and guilt of my own actions, when my mind snapped in the end. The deaths of my comrades weighs on me still, though the recent reappearance of several has eased my burden some. Even they, though, cannot ease the burden of the actions taken in full possession of my own sanity, in the year and a half between ABADDON and my arrival at Kira's home in Heliopolis._

"_During that time, I interrogated and executed any number of Blue Cosmos agents, and fought off even more of their assassins as I crossed the Earth; leaving a trail of dead bodies, missing persons, and destroyed buildings across five continents, even I have no idea how many died by my hands, claws, and revolvers._

"_And after I finally found peace for a time, the First Earth/ZAFT War came to Heliopolis, and dragged my friends onto the battlefield… and forced me to face my past once again. This time, while I was still an avenger, I swore to myself there would be no more murder, no more death such as I had meted out as the Crimson Tiger. And I held to that… and watched as others did it in my stead, at Alaska, Panama, and Orb. I watched as Fredrik Ades was sacrificed by Rau Le Creuset at Mendel, and I came too late to save the asteroid fortress Boaz from destruction. I fought my way through the Second Battle of Jachin Due with my comrades; I boarded Jachin with Athrun and Cagalli, and personally incinerated the man responsible for the loss of my humanity._

"_I watched as Muruta Azrael launched nuclear weapons all across space, and presided over his death; I was there when Patrick Zala triggered GENESIS, before I killed him… I sacrificed myself to destroy that weapon, and then returned to a life of peace._

"_Many atrocities I have suffered, committed, and witnessed… yet somehow, the sight of what Yuna Roma Seiran has brought Orb's loyal soldiers to is almost worse. That they should be led to throw their lives away for a cause as despicable as the alliance between Orb and the Earth Alliance sickens me._

"_And it is yet one more reason why Yuna Roma Seiran _will_ die by my hand."  
_

-Excerpt from _The Tragic Spiral of War_ by Force Operation X Colonel Kevin Walker

* * *

"The current military situation, Mr. President, is utterly intolerable."

Djibril's voice was flat as he stared at Atlantic Federation President Copeland's image. There was no need to raise his voice, nor to give any word any particular emphasis; they both knew exactly what Djibril was talking about… and they also knew that Copeland could be out of a job –or a life- in a heartbeat if Blue Cosmos' leader so decried.

"I understand that, Lord Djibril," Copeland said, choosing his words –and tone- with deadly care. "Unfortunately, I don't see anything that we can really do about it. The Atlantic Federation is already heavily committed, and Eurasia is busy with its myriad of internal conflicts… and wondering if the destroyer of their Ukrainian base is waiting to strike again."

The situation in space was one they both knew well, of course. In the time since the abortive nuclear attack on the PLANTs, the Earth Alliance had so far had little success in various skirmishes against ZAFT. The new ZAFT mobile suits were tough, fast, and heavily armed, to the extent that the Earth Forces' Daggers and Windams frequently found themselves outmatched.

Nor did it help that the so-called "Prometheus Fleet" seemed to have entered the equation, launching small strikes against Earth Alliance convoys before fading back to their hidden base.

All in all, especially combined with ZAFT's recent successes in the Middle East and Eurasia, the war was not going well for the Earth Alliance.

"You're forgetting something, Mr. President," Djibril pointed out, leaning back in his chair. "The Atlantic and Eurasian Federations are, indeed, the greatest contributors to the Earth Alliance… but as you may recall, there's a recent signatory that, so far, remains unblooded."

Copeland's eyes widened. "You mean… Orb?"

"That's exactly what I mean," the Blue Cosmos leader confirmed with a slight smile. "Why not? It's about time they held up their end of the treaty, after all."

"But…" Copeland paused. "But I thought Walker had done a great deal of damage to Orb's military infrastructure before his departure…"

Djibril grimaced. "It's true that he did manage to wipe just about all of Morgenroete's engineering data," he admitted, "and effectively ruined the latest production of Murasames, but he was either in too much of a hurry or thought it too risky to destroy _all_ of Orb's military might. Their existing mobile suits and ships are in perfect shape, and more than enough to add a significant edge to our next attack."

Copeland nodded slowly. "But what about the possibility of Walker interfering? I doubt anyone would be stupid enough to believe anyone would try to impersonate him –too many people want him dead for anyone to _want_ to be in his position- so if he were to give an order for Orb forces to stand down…"

"I've considered that," Djibril acknowledged with a shrug. "The Seirans, however, assure me that the Crimson Tiger abandoned all rank and titles before his departure. Whether they believe it's really him or not, he has no legal authority over them at all." He smiled. "With that in mind… I think they'll be perfect to help us drive ZAFT completely out of the Black Sea region."

* * *

Over a thousand kilometers distant, Yuna Roma Seiran strode into the command center within Orb's military headquarters. Resplendent in an Orb commodore's uniform, he basked in the salutes sent his way by the many and varied officers present.

He might've been a little less flattered, of course, had he realized the vast majority of said officers viewed him as an incompetent waste of perfectly good carbon and water.

As Yuna entered, Captain Todaka came to his feet and saluted. "My Lord," he greeted, carefully hiding his own feelings regarding the nobleman. "You wanted to see me, Sir?"

"Yes, I did," Yuna acknowledged with a smile. "I happen to have new orders for you, Captain." He nodded toward the large map displayed on one of the room's screens. "As per the request of our new allies, we'll be dispatching an expeditionary force to help the Atlantic Federation drive ZAFT out of the Black Sea, where they've recently had several victories."

Todaka nodded impassively. "I see, Sir. We're to participate directly in the fighting then, My Lord?"

"Exactly." Yuna walked over to a chair, and neatly slid into it. "You'll be commanding the flagship, Captain… and I'm going along as well, as fleet commander."

"Understood, My Lord," the Orb officer acknowledged, feeling it best not to point out that he'd rather serve under a senile zebra. "May I ask exactly what it is that we're expected to accomplish once we're there, Sir?"

"My understanding is that we'll most likely be engaging the _Minerva_ herself," the nobleman replied casually. "It suits me just fine. After all, we had a shot at that ship once, and failed in our allies' expectations. It'll be nice to remove that blot from our record."

_I'm sure,_ Todaka thought acidly. _No doubt you're suitably distressed by the maintenance problems that plagued our fleet the last time you told us to fire on them… though it's probably fortunate you don't know what _really_ happened there._

His thoughts were interrupted by a snort from behind Yuna… and several audible gasps from other officers, as another voice spoke up. "A blot on your record? Well, all things considered, Yuna, you probably _could_ do with having some of those blots removed. You and your family certainly have plenty of them."

Yuna froze. _I know that voice,_ he thought, alarms ringing distantly in his mind, _but who…?_ His eyes went wide. _It can't be!_

The young noble slowly turned, scarcely noticing as Todaka's jaw dropped in shock of his own. Yuna's own attention was completely fixed on the gray-haired, jade-eyed man in the uniform of an Orb general… a man neither Yuna nor anyone else had seen in Orb in over five years.

"Y…y…y…" Yuna stared at the apparition, at first unable to produce anything resembling coherent speech, before finally blurting out, "You're supposed to be dead!"

Baron John Tyler Onishi tilted his head curiously. "Am I not?" he questioned, looking at his own hand in feigned confusion. "Why, it looks like your powers of deduction are as sharp as ever, Yuna. I'm _not_ dead, at that." He smiled thinly. "No, I'm not dead. I merely felt it necessary to… remove myself from public view for a while, whilst I recovered my resources and health. My son seemed to be managing things well enough in my absence, so I deemed there to be enough time for me to recoup my losses, particularly from the attack on _Amaterasu."_

It took several moments for Yuna to realize he was gaping like a fish, and even then it took a veritable act of will to close his mouth. "But… but… why are you here _now?_ Why have you come back, Baron? And…"

"What does this mean for Orb's government?" Onishi finished, with a faint smile. "That last question is one I suspect will take much time –and consultation with your father- to answer properly. As to the first… why, it's simple enough. With Orb involved in a new war, I simply saw it as my duty to come back and reclaim my position, in order to do my part for our great nation. Moreover… well, let's just say that I'm no longer so sure of Kevin's capacity as Baron of the Onishi family."

Todaka's eyes narrowed. _The old baron returns after six years of being thought dead… and the first thing he does is hint that he no longer approves of how his son handles things? Hm… and with his involvement in the original Sturm Falke project seven years ago… No. Something is _not_ right here._

He discretely cleared his throat. "So, My Lord," he began carefully, "you're taking the title back from your son?"

"Technically, it can hardly be said that I'm 'taking it back'," Onishi pointed out, "since I've been alive all this time. In essence, however, yes. I believe Kevin's policies have been… perhaps not the wisest course he might've taken, and as his father I must take responsibilities for his mistakes, and return him to the role of the learner in the ways of politics."

"Interesting idea," another voice mused, "but perhaps a little late, John. I happen to know that Kevin threw aside his noble titles, along with his rank in the Orb military, before he pulled his little vanishing act."

Onishi turned, and his eyebrow went up. "Rondo Mina Sahaku," he noted, watching the sole survivor of the Sahaku family walk into the room. "My son's childhood friend… except that I seem to remember the two of you weren't on such good terms in recent years."

"We patched things up," Mina replied, "after I gave up on world domination. I daresay I'm more of a friend to him now than you, John… and I also think that he's not going to care overmuch if you resume the title of Baron Onishi. My own observation is that, if he could get away with it, he'd take Cagalli to some remote corner of the world, and never come back. Or maybe take to traveling on his personal mobile assault ship, instead. Either way, I'm quite certain he has no interest in the Barony… and I doubt his heir does, either."

The sole surviving Sahaku had the satisfaction of seeing genuine surprise on Onishi's face at last, as her last remark registered. "His _heir?"_ Onishi repeated carefully. "Just what on earth are you talking about, Sahaku? My son is only nineteen; certainly he has no heirs of his own yet."

"Wrong," she replied, smiling inwardly. "As a matter of fact, it's a matter of public record now that Kevin's daughter, Max, is heir to the Walker line… and, if he should choose to return to Orb –assuming you don't disown him- she becomes third in line for the Onishi barony, as well."

Onishi paused, taking a moment to recover his poise. _An heir to that failure… and no doubt just as opposed to my plans as Kevin himself. That is _not_ part of the grand design, not at all. Her existence will complicate things even more… But where did this "daughter" come from in the first place? Uzumi's child?_

"All right," he said at last. "So he has an heir… but who, may I ask, is the mother? Kevin's never been the sort to have affairs. I know him _that_ well, and I don't imagine him having changed that in the last six years."

"According to the records filed just before _Archangel_ departed Orb," Mina replied, "the mother is deceased. Some woman by the name of Rachel Carver."

_Rachel Carver,_ Onishi thought, eyes narrowing imperceptibly. _Of course… one of the ABADDON, and supposedly Kevin's girlfriend at the time. But… how? Even if he was the type to start that early, she died six years ago. Unless… genetic fusion under laboratory conditions? If they found a sample of her DNA…_

"I see," he murmured. "So, Orb's political arena may get even _more_ complicated in years to come, hm? I think I'll have to have a small talk with Kevin on the subject, the next time I see him." Onishi shook his head wryly. "Anything else I should know about? I've tried to keep an eye on things from afar while away, but I can see I missed some fairly important events."

Yuna cleared his throat, determined to regain control of the conversation. "Actually," he began, "there is. Though she's been spirited away by those traitors on the _Archangel,_ Cagalli Yula Athha happens to have recently become my wife, and-"

"Be quiet, Yuna," Mina broke in, shaking her head. "In the first place, Freedom interrupted the priest before he could finish the ceremony, and in the second, it was politically motivated anyway. With Cagalli converted to Kevin's way of thinking, I believe it's safe to assume that her engagement with _you_ is off, and that the date for her wedding to Kevin will be announced as soon as this war is over."

Yuna flushed, and started sputtering something about lies and propaganda, and Onishi shook his head. _It figures. The only political forces of any consequence in this nation who aren't dead are myself and Sahaku. My son is uninterested in politics and suffering from a fatal virus, Uzumi is dead, and the Seirans are incompetents who probably aren't even long for this world. Kevin will almost certainly take care of them, then drop dead himself…_

_This may be even easier than I'd expected._

"Well," Onishi said aloud, "I see things have become rather… complicated in the time I was away. With that in mind, Yuna, I would suggest you go see about your fleet command… while I meet with your father, and get the political situation straightened out."

"An excellent idea," Mina pronounced, before Yuna could reply. "You two go right ahead and do just that. It has little to do with me, under the circumstances, except inasmuch as it's Kevin's money that's funding the completion of the orbit elevator. Under the circumstances, then, I'll take my leave now; I have affairs at Ame-no-Mihashira to take care of."

Nodding at the other two nobles and giving Todaka a sympathetic look, she swept out of the room.

Onishi watched her go, shrewd mind already examining the possibilities. _Hm… no, I may not need to bother removing her at all. Certainly not yet. With her father and brother gone, she seems more interested in Orb's welfare in general than in who holds the reigns of power… and I expect she'd find even me preferable to the Seirans._

Yes, it appeared that his objective in Orb would be even easier to accomplish than he'd thought.

* * *

Aboard the carrier _John Paul_ _Jones,_ Neo Roanoke strode through the corridors, frowning pensively behind his mask. _Sooner or later,_ he mused, _someone in the brass is going to get the bright idea to bring Orb into the fighting directly… and when that happens, will _he_ be back?_

Ordinarily, Neo wouldn't have thought much about the matter at all. Individual enemy soldiers were not his concern. This one, however… one thing he'd become quite certain of –based on several battles now- was that something that had occurred in Orb, almost certainly related to the Seirans, had triggered the resurgence of Kevin Onishi's cyborg super-soldier persona. That was a cause for great concern among the Earth Forces… and his patrons in Logos.

It was also a concern for Neo himself. Not only was the Crimson Tiger a highly dangerous adversary –holding the distinction of killing more Blue Cosmos members than any other person alive, as well as piloting a tremendously powerful mobile suit- but he also seemed disturbingly familiar to Neo himself.

The phantom memories that had been plaguing him since first seeing Walker fight in the Sturm Vogel had never gotten very strong, but they were most definitely persistent. Neo was becoming increasingly convinced that he had, at some point in the past, encountered the Crimson Tiger personally… and lived to tell the tale, which was itself a very unusual occurrence for anyone connected with Blue Cosmos or the Earth Alliance.

_But where?_ Neo wondered. _Sometime during the last war? Must've been; he didn't let _anyone_ live in the years before that, and in the years since he's kept his systems offline, only reemerging recently…_

His thoughts were interrupted by a commotion from somewhere ahead. "The Extendeds' regeneration chamber…?" Neo murmured to himself. Shrugging, he set off to find out what the disturbance was.

"Sounds like Stellar… Something to do with her time in Diocuia?"

"No!" the young pilot's voice called out. "Don't take it from me!"

Stepping into the compartment, Neo raised an eyebrow, seeing Stellar arguing with several technicians… one of whom was trying to take what seemed to be a handkerchief from the young girl.

"What seems to be the problem?" Neo questioned.

"She's being stubborn, Sir," the lead technician said frankly, motioning toward Stellar. "We're trying to get her squared away for the night, but she-"

"Please don't take it from me!" Stellar insisted, clutching the handkerchief tightly. "It's important to me!"

"It's all right," the technician trying to retrieve it said soothingly. "Please, let's just finish up for the night, so you can get some rest…"

"Wait," Neo interrupted. "Just a second." He walked over to Stellar, motioning the technician away. Putting a hand on Stellar's shoulder, he said, "It's all right, Stellar. If it's that important to you, no one's going to take it from you, okay?"

She looked up at him with wide, innocent eyes. "Really?"

"Really," he promised, with a smile. _So trusting,_ he thought to himself. _Too trusting, maybe… but I'll do what I can._

_It's the only way I can even pretend to still be human, after using these kids as I have._

Stellar smiled up at him. "Thank you!" _I won't forget,_ she thought to herself. _His promise… he said he'd protect me… and that we'd see each other again…_

"In that case," Neo remarked, stepping back, "there's no problem here, after all." He turned toward the hatch, and began walking away.

The lead technician caught up with him on his way out. "Are you sure that's such a good idea?" he asked quietly. "Letting her keep that?"

Neo sighed. "…I'm not sure," he admitted. "But… with what we put them through, I see no real harm." He looked up at the deckhead, as though seeing the sky beyond. "I have to wonder… are people happier with or without memories? Her encounter in Diocuia clearly left some kind of impact on her…"

The tech shook his head. "A weapon doesn't need memories," he stated. "They'll only get in the way of the weapon's performance."

"Are you sure of that?" The masked captain turned to meet the other man's eyes squarely. "They say the Crimson Tiger was an amnesiac at the height of Blue Cosmos' hunt for him, and he killed hundreds of those sent after him. Yet when he chose to protect his friends during the war, he fought even more ferociously than before. Why do you think that is, Doctor?"

"It may make him a more motivated soldier," the tech conceded, "but it also makes him an unpredictable one. He makes his own decisions based on loyalties other than to his superiors; we have no need for soldiers like that, Captain Roanoke."

"Hm… maybe not…"

_But still,_ Neo mused, leaving the regeneration area behind, _I can't help but wonder… who has thrown away more humanity? The man melded with the machine… or the man who would use children in this way?  
_

* * *

_Well,_ Athrun Zala thought, as he strode down one of _Minerva_'s corridors, _at least not _quite_ every pilot on this ship hates me right now._

Beside him walked the newest addition to the ship's roster, Heine Westenfluss. A fellow veteran of the first war, he was also an outgoing sort, who got along just as well with Shinn and Luna as he did with Athrun; as far as the blue-haired pilot could tell, Heine reserved negativity solely for his enemies.

_Although,_ Athrun thought to himself, _there's the possibility that one pilot I consider a friend is also one he considers an enemy…_

Heine was also, of course, very new to the _Minerva_ in general, which was why Athrun was escorting him to the cafeteria. It wouldn't do for the ship's new FAITH pilot to get lost on his way to meeting his fellow pilots, after all.

When the pair actually reached the hatch, though, Athrun was surprised when Heine abruptly stopped, not yet opening the hatch. "…Is there something wrong?" he asked uncertainly, puzzled by the other pilot's action.

"I have to ask you something," Heine said, after a moment's pause, and turned his head to gaze levelly at Athrun. "About Kevin Walker."

"…What about him?" Athrun asked warily. He'd been expecting the issue to come up sooner or later –his friendship with Kevin Walker was considered very controversial within ZAFT; almost as controversial as Kevin himself- but not quite in this manner.

"I want to know what the _real_ Walker is like," Heine said levelly. "The Earth Forces call him a murderer, but they're heavily influenced by Blue Cosmos; a good chunk of ZAFT agrees with them, but most of those soldiers don't know any more about the man than I do. Since you're one of the few living members of ZAFT who has actually met him, I think you're the best source I'm going to get, Athrun."

Athrun turned his gaze to the deck, and closed his eyes. _The real Kevin Walker… now that's a surprising question, on this ship. And one that's difficult to properly answer, since even I know he does some… questionable things when he feels the need. Things that someone who _doesn't_ know him as well as I do might well take to mean he really is the monster so many people accuse him of being…_

"…The real Kevin Walker," he said at last, raising his head. "That's… an interesting question, Heine. But if you're asking me if he's a murderer, then all I can say is, not recently."

Heine raised an eyebrow, not having expected such a response. "Not recently?" he repeated. "Than should I assume that the rumors about his actions between ABADDON and his time on Heliopolis are true?"

"Mostly," Athrun admitted. "I don't know the full story –I doubt even Cagalli does, really- but Kevin is honest about his past to hose closest to him. He doesn't deny that he did a lot of… questionable things, when using the 'Crimson Tiger' identity. He even admits that, on a couple of occasions, what he did to Blue Cosmos members could easily be construed as murder. _But,"_ he continued, meeting Heine's gaze, "there's a lot more to him than that, and judging him based on how he was during those years would be doing him a disservice. Kevin is, I'll admit, prepared to do things I'm more than a little uncomfortable with, if he believes it necessary. He is also, however, someone with a strict, if peculiar, code of honor that he won't break. Four or five years ago, he was also operating under fairly extreme conditions, I should note."

"Being chased across the entire planet by a group of murderous fanatics will do that," Heine agreed, nodding slightly. "And now?"

Athrun shrugged. "Now? Now he'll do anything –and I do mean _anything-_ to protect those close to him; I have no doubt that he'd destroy the entire planet in a heartbeat if he thought it was needed to defend Cagalli… or if she told him to. But unless you _make_ him your enemy, you don't have anything to fear from him. He doesn't attack without cause… and I honestly think he's tired of the killing that's typified his life so far."

Heine frowned thoughtfully, taking it all in, and Athrun held his breath. How Heine chose to take his words would be very important… possibly making the difference between life and death, for himself and for others. _But if he decides Kevin _is_ a threat…_

After a minute's thought, Heine nodded slowly. "I see," he murmured. "Not exactly the safest individual around, but not an immediate threat, either… as I thought."

Athrun tilted his head, surprised. "You already thought that about Kevin?"

Heine smiled faintly. "Athrun, I'm not unfamiliar with the actions of Nemesis when _Minerva_ was escaping Orb; nor did it slip my notice that this ship is currently traveling in the company of one of Walker's ships. Those aren't the actions of indiscriminate murderer." He nodded at the hatch. "With that cleared up… shall we?"

"Of course." Feeling more than a little relief, Athrun opened the hatch, and stepped through it with Heine.

Inside the cafeteria, the _Minerva_'s other pilots were already having lunch; with the ship preparing to leave Diocuia, with an uncertain course ahead of them, they knew it was best to eat while they had the chance, lest battle catch them unprepared.

Occupied though they might be with food, however, they quickly stood when their commander and newest shipmate entered. "Mr. Westenfluss," Shinn greeted swiftly, bringing his right hand up in the ZAFT salute. "I'm Shinn Asuka, Sir."

Heine smiled, returning the salute. "Yes, I remember from when we met the other day, before meeting with the Chairman." He turned to the other two. "And you would be…?" He'd met Shinn's fellows days earlier, but hadn't yet caught their names.

"Lunamaria Hawke, Sir," Luna replied quickly. "ZAKU Warrior pilot."

"Rey Za Burrel," Rey said in turn, remaining more composed than his fellows. "I fly a ZAKU Phantom."

Heine nodded. "I see… I've heard quite a bit about you people by now, you know. The forefront of ZAFT's operations so far, and quite an impressive group. The Lohengrin Gate operation was particularly noteworthy." He glanced around, expression thoughtful. "_Minerva_ certainly is quite the ship. Powerful… and large; without Athrun's help, I'd have gotten lost on the way here. Certainly a lot different from a _Nazca."_

"Have you ever served on a _Nazca_-class, Sir?" Luna asked interestedly.

"Not for extended periods," he replied, sliding into a chair. "I've been aboard them for transit from place to place, but for most the interval between the wars I was stationed at Aprilius One. I _was_ involved in the defense against the Earth Alliance's nuclear attack at the beginning of the new war, though, and I flew off Jachin Due during the last battle of the first war." Heine shook his head. "Quite the mess that was… At any rate, I may not have spent much time on _Nazcas,_ but I've been around them enough to know that they're nothing like this."

"Not as big?" Shinn postulated, when the older pilot paused.

Heine smiled. "Well, yeah, there's that, but I was actually thinking more of _Minerva_'s raw power. No _Nazca_ could stand up to her, certainly; and I doubt the 'Bogey One' you people fought in space would've lasted long in a straight-up fight, either. In fact, I think the only classes of ship that _could_ potentially stand up to her are the _Archangel_ and _Izumo_ ships."

"Our mobile suits would be enough to compensate for that, Sir," Shinn opined, expression turning resolute. "An _Izumo_ is little more than a well-armed transport, and there are only two _Archangel_-class ships in existence right now. _Minerva_ could handle them."

"Maybe so," Heine conceded amiably. "But we're not likely to find out, now are we? Orb has five _Izumos_ nominally under their control, but with one of them belonging to the Sahaku family –which always has their own agenda, from what I hear- and one under the direct control of the 'rogue aristocrat' Kevin Walker, they effectively have only three… and I don't think those three are likely to be sent after us, either. And as to the _Archangel_-class, the _Archangel_ herself hasn't shown much interest in getting involved in this war, and _Dominion_ has been expressly assigned to _support_ us."

The black-haired pilot twitched his shoulders irritably. "Maybe so… but I'll never trust anything Walker does, Sir. His hatred for ZAFT, his bloody past…"

Heine shrugged. "I prefer not to make such judgments without appropriate evidence, Shinn," he said quietly. "Evidence which hasn't yet appeared in _this_ conflict, from what I understand. But," he continued, "I don't see any reason to argue about it. Either he's a man of his word, and nothing ever comes of this, or he does something stupid and we have to take whatever measures are necessary. Either way, a discussion now is basically moot." He smiled then. "And please, all of you, call me Heine. We're all ZAFT pilots, and ZAFT is a militia, not a rigidly-structured military; redcoat or green, FAITH or not, we're all pilots, and I think that makes us even. Working together as friends is better than adhering to protocol, I think." He shot a teasing glance at Athrun. "Of course, not everybody works the same way, _Commander_ Zala."

Though Heine clearly meant it as mere teasing, Athrun still winced inwardly. _I wish I _could_ be more like him,_ he thought to himself. _I remember, on the _Archangel,_ everyone acted more like a family than a military unit, and that brought them out of the war alive and well…_

"There _is_ something to be said for that attitude, I'll admit," a Ukrainian-accented voice mused. "Certainly it seems to work for at least some groups."

Heine glanced up, and raised an eyebrow as a woman in a coal-black uniform, with brown hair and silver eyes, stepped into the compartment. Moving with inhuman grace and precision, his attention was instantly riveted. The combination of the gait and unfamiliar uniform –especially the crossed scythes patch where Heine's own FAITH emblem would be- immediately piqued the pilot's curiosity. _Who is this…?_

After a moment, he cleared his throat. "Excuse me, Miss, but may I ask who you are? We've not yet been introduced, and I must admit, your uniform is unfamiliar…"

She smiled. "My apologies, Mr. Westenfluss; I tend to forget that my unit isn't widely known at this point. Possibly just as well," she conceded, "since we lost two of our people even before our existence became public within ZAFT… but I digress." She held out her hand. "My name is Commander Natalya Ivanova Arkanian, also known as Delta. My uniform is that of a special unit, one originally formed some six years ago. Certain circumstances of which you're probably aware forced the disbanding –and almost total destruction- of the original group, but it's recently been reformed under my leadership. You would know us as the ABADDON."

Heine's eyebrows went up, as he took Arkanian's hand. "The ABADDON unit… I've heard of it, and the… excesses the original staff were known for, but I hadn't heard it had been reconstituted. And… that's right; you'd be _that_ Arkanian, huh? The one they called the 'Legendary Mercenary'? It's an honor to meet you, Commander."

Arkanian's smile turned wry. "_Now_ who's being formal, Heine? Call me Natalya, or Delta; that's what my old students did. Well," she amended, "my greatest pupil calls me Natalya Ivanova, but then he's turned himself into half a Russian anyway."

Watching the two of them interact, Athrun only barely restrained himself from shaking his head in bemusement… and from the look on his face, it appeared Shinn was feeling much the same. By now, they'd all had a fair amount of contact with the Destroyer archetype, if only from passing her in the corridors, and seeing her act in such way was… perplexing.

_She's also friendly enough,_ Athrun thought to himself, _even if she does always look ready to break anybody who crosses her in two… but this is just plain strange. Does Heine have enough charisma to get along with even someone like her, or are their personalities somehow complementary, in some bizarre way?_

As Arkanian and Heine began to exchange war stories –Heine's actions during Second Jachin, and Arkanian's early days as a mercenary- Athrun made a mental note to talk to Kevin about it when he had the chance. As far as he knew, the sandy-haired super-soldier knew Delta better than just about anyone else still alive, so maybe _he_ had an explanation.

_Although,_ he mused, _I wouldn't bet on it…  
_

* * *

"Piece of vnyebrachnyi junk!" Kevin Walker hissed, shaking his hand as the jolt of electricity caused it to twitch.

Cagalli Yula Athha, standing at the hatch to the small maintenance room, shook her head with a fond smile. She'd come looking for Kevin in regards to a serious matter, but she found her mood lightening when she finally located him down here, near the ship's armory.

The particular section they were in now had been added when the _Archangel_ was lengthened between the wars. A preexisting compartment, its original function and contents had been transferred to another part of the ship, and the entire compartment had been revamped with Prometheus-designed equipment, some intended to service Nemesis, and others related to Kevin's many and varied man –or at least Destroyer- portable high-tech gadgets.

At the moment, from what Cagalli could see, he was tinkering with a suit of powered battle armor, similar to the suits worn by Invictus and the enigmatic Hyperion. It also appeared to be malfunctioning, judging from the power surge that had nearly fried his left hand just as she entered.

"Having some trouble, Kevin?" she asked in amusement, stepping fully into the compartment.

"Mildly, tovarisch," Kevin grunted, not bothering to look up from his work. "Junction A in Subsection Three of the armor's power system keeps shorting out; I think it has something to do with the cross-connection between the railgun capacitors and the plasma energy conduits, but…" He swore vilely in Russian, as a smaller jolt shocked his cybernetic hand.

"I didn't understand half of what you just said," Cagalli remarked, going to her knees next to him, "but I'll take your word for it." Tilting her head, she gave the armor a quick glance, and raised an eyebrow. "Just what _is_ this thing, anyway? It doesn't look like John's gear, or Hyperion's…"

"That's because it isn't," Kevin explained, pulling his head out of the torso armor he'd been working on. "Newest model, developed by my Prometheus whiz kids; they're calling it a Mark VI battle suit, continuing the old ABADDON line." He tapped the armor's outer surface. "Fifteen percent denser than a Mark V, but with dexterity closer to a Mark IV; equipped with built-in thermoptic camouflage, psychometric shielding, and a stronger AKWES field than my onboard system. Sidearm holsters concealed in compartments within both thighs, provision for plasma rifle and railgun systems, and powered 'muscles' three percent stronger than a Mark V. All of it powered, of course, by a new generation of RTG."

She shook her head. "Always looking to build a better bomb, huh, Kevin? You never change."

He stood, picking up the armor. "Actually," he said quietly, stepping over to an equipment locker, "there's a reason for all this." Sliding the locker open, he carefully tucked the battle suit away, and then continued, "With a certain new threat to deal with, it seemed prudent to get the new armor working."

It took Cagalli no more than three seconds to figure out what her boyfriend was talking about. "Mike Carnehan, right?" she said quietly.

Kevin nodded somberly, eyes sober behind his perpetual shades. "I don't think he's like us anymore," he said softly. "Leona and I have been talking it over, along with some of the brainiacs at Artemis, and we've come to the conclusion that the fact that his body is dead actually gives him some advantages over a normal Destroyer. It means that they don't need to worry so much about the body's physical limits… or about things like infections."

_That_ statement took her a few moments to puzzle out. Kevin had a tendency to be somewhat obscure when speaking of cybernetics; she suspected it was, at least in part, because he was accustomed to speaking of such matters with experts in the field. She was not, however, completely ignorant on the subject, either. _Don't have to worry about infections,_ she thought, frowning. _Or about the body's physical limits…_

She glanced up sharply in sudden comprehension. "Complete bone replacement?"

Kevin nodded, with a faint smile at her deduction. "Exactly. It means he has no need for bone marrow, so they probably completely replaced the calcium in his skeleton with battle steel. My own bones are only twenty-five percent synthetic; his are potentially _one hundred percent,_ and that gives him a significant edge in both strength and durability."

Cagalli winced, having seen for herself the results of Kevin's own handiwork on more than one occasion. The idea of someone even stronger… "I see why you want the armor on hand," she said, thinking back to Kevin's previous confrontation with Carnehan, and Jack Carter's attack on the Onishi Mansion. "But… first you have to bring him to ground, right? Are you sure you can even handle Foxhound?"

He shook his head. "No," he admitted. "In fact, I'm virtually positive now that I _can't;_ its performance the one time we fought was even greater than I'd expected, more than Nemesis can compensate for. Foxhound is too far beyond Jachin-era machines. It would take a better pilot than me to properly challenge Mike so long as he has Foxhound in his possession."

That, Cagalli knew, was a sobering admission on her boyfriend's part. Not originally a pilot by trade or habit, Kevin was, in fact, an average pilot at best without his augmentation. With it, however –and the systems he'd built to take advantage of it- he was a formidable opponent indeed, having managed to hold off GAT-X303 Aegis, with Athrun Zala in the cockpit, while flying a cobbled-together hybrid of GINN and G-weapon. With the original Stormhawk, he'd also easily held off dozens of mass-produced mobile suits all by himself, and performed well against the Earth Forces' biological CPUs; it was only Rau Le Creuset's Providence that had finally brought him down.

Moreover, Kevin had also stopped ZAFT's rising star, Shinn Asuka, in his tracks, with little effort. To be fair, that was due in part to Nemesis' superiority, but that made it no less true. So if Kevin couldn't defeat Foxhound, even with Nemesis at his disposal, the only pilot who likely _could_ was…

"Kira and Leona," Cagalli murmured. "You're counting on either or both of them to bring him down, to where you can finish him?"

"Exactly," Kevin confirmed. "That's where our differing skills become complementary: he defeats the mobile suit, I defeat the pilot. Simple… in theory, and if I can overcome Mike's potential advantages. That's why I was working on the armor." He absently rubbed the long, wicked scar that bisected his face. "In any case, I somehow don't think that's what brought you here, tovarisch. Something up?"

Cagalli nodded somberly, reminded of her original reason for coming. "Yeah. Kevin… we just received word that an Orb fleet is currently on its way to link up with Earth Alliance naval forces in the Black Sea. Andy thinks they're going to be used in direct combat with ZAFT this time… most likely against the _Minerva."_

A shadow crossed Kevin's face, and he took off his shades, brow furrowed in thought. The faces of Athrun Zala, the Hawke sisters, and Alec King passed through his mind… _My friends,_ he thought, _and two sisters I swore to do everything I could to protect, to do what little penance I may for Erica's death. And… Orb military forces, from my own nation… I care little for Orb, or any other nation, but I'd hate to see them fall to Seiran's treason… and I know Cagalli would be hurt, too._

It all passed through his mind in a heartbeat, and then his glowing jade eyes met Cagalli's. "We're going, then?" he asked quietly.

Cagalli nodded. "Right. We can't stop _Minerva_ from engaging them –we're only one ship, and it would be wrong to try and stop them from defending themselves anyway- but Murrue and Andy agree that we should do what we can to try and keep Orb forces out of this."

Kevin nodded, tucking away his sunglasses and drawing his revolver. "I don't want to see any of them die, either," he admitted, twirling the weapon around his right index finger. "They don't deserve to lose their lives because Yuna and Unato decided to sell them out."

"I know," she agreed. "It's not going to be easy, since I don't think Yuna's going to just let them obey my orders, but… we have to do what we can."

"Agreed." With a sigh, he tossed his revolver into the air, caught it, and dropped it back into its holster. "Well, she's not really made for it, but Nemesis can disable targets, if need be. Between Kira, Leona, and me, we should be able to keep Orb mobile suits out of the fight. The ships are going to be a dicey proposition, though."

"I know," Cagalli repeated. "And that's one reason I came looking for you. Murrue wants to talk to you and Kira about it; if you've got any ideas, we need them in the next two days."

* * *

Yuna Roma Seiran was beginning to regret his decision to personally accompany Orb Task Force 15 to the Black Sea. It had seemed like such a good idea at the time… but now he was violently seasick.

On the Orb trimaran mobile suit carrier _Takemikazuchi_'s bridge, Captain Junichiro Todaka shook his head, seeing Yuna empty the contents of his stomach over the side of the ship. _Seasick,_ he thought in mild disgust. _Maybe he should've thought of that _before_ we got fifteen thousand kilometers out from Orb…_

"Something wrong, Captain?"

Todaka glanced up, and found his executive officer looking at him in concern. "Nothing, Commander," he assured the other man. "It's nothing, really."

Commander Ichiro Amagi politely snorted. "Since you were looking at our 'leader' suffering the side effects of his decision, Captain, I somehow don't think it was 'nothing'," he disputed, lowering his voice. "Am I wrong, Sir?"

Todaka sighed. "…No, Commander, you aren't." He glanced at Yuna again. "That man… is this really the product of one of the Five Noble Families?"

"I can't entirely dispute your sentiment, Captain," Amagi said quietly, knowing exactly what his superior was speaking of. "Nonetheless… he _is_ nominally in charge of this expedition, with the full support of the Prime Minister."

"Who also happens to be his father," Todaka pointed out, shaking his head. "I doubt those two facts are unrelated. Moreover… nominally in command or not, you know as well as I do who will really be making the tactical decisions. He makes the policies, but he's out of his depth here; actual tactical thinking will have to be done by someone more competent."

Amagi nodded. "True enough," he agreed. "And I'm sure, Sir, that you'll be doing a better job of it than he. Still, orders _are_ orders in this regard…"

"Oh, I know," the captain said sourly. "I'll follow my orders, no matter how distasteful I find them. Nevertheless, Ichiro, I find myself wishing a different noble were commanding this operation. I can think of at least three who'd do an excellent job here."

"Cagalli Yula Athha, Rondo Mina Sahaku, and Kevin Onishi," Amagi guessed. "The only problems being that Lady Cagalli has apparently been kidnapped by Lord Onishi-" they shared a grimace at that; neither of them were pleased that the younger Onishi had been supplanted by his father "-and Lady Sahaku seems to have retreated to Ame-no-Mihashira, to concentrate on her own affairs."

Todaka turned to the forward viewport with another sigh. "Yes," he said quietly, "that's true… though I, for one, don't believe Lady Cagalli's kidnapping was what it seemed. Certainly the Colonel had nothing to do with it; I know him, and if that had truly been his goal, he'd have been with Freedom at the start, rather than turning up in the middle to lend support. More likely, news of the engagement had him preparing to leave Orb –and his problems- behind him completely." He shook his head. "Still… if you ask me, Ichiro, what we're doing now isn't the true spirit of Orb. Orb's ideals will be carried not by Yuna Roma Seiran, but by Lady Cagalli… and Colonel Onishi."

"Assuming they're ever able to return to Orb," Amagi murmured. "Or willing to. From the rumors I've been hearing…"

"It's possible they won't be coming back," Todaka acknowledged. "Even so, Orb's ideals will live on in them, even if they have to take them to another part of the planet… or into space."

He turned away then, losing himself in thought. _There's just one thing,_ he mused. _The Colonel is openly hostile to Seiran… and he probably isn't very happy with his father right now, either. Which means he's unlikely to take the current situation calmly _or_ peacefully._

_Colonel… may we never face each other in battle…  
_

* * *

"Transmission from headquarters, Sir," _John Paul Jones_' communications officer reported, breaking into Neo Roanoke's thoughts.

Glancing up, Neo stood from his chair in the center of the carrier's bridge, and crossed to the comm officer's station. "From Washington, hm? Any idea what it is, Lieutenant?"

The officer handed him a hardcopy printout. "Looks like new orders, Sir," he said with a shrug. "Something to do with possible operations to retake the areas surrounding the Black Sea, I think."

"Hm…" Thanking the lieutenant, Neo rubbed his chin thoughtfully, and strode back to his chair. _New orders… I suppose they've finally thought of a way to compensate for ZAFT's heavy concentration of forces in the Black Sea… but is it actually workable, or some brilliant idea conceived by an armchair strategist who's never been anywhere near the frontlines?_

He wouldn't have been particularly surprised either way. As with any military, some of the battle plans thought up by the Atlantic Federation's rear-echelon officers were brilliant… and some were great ways to waste resources and get uncounted numbers of soldiers killed.

Finally settling his gaze on the printout, Neo's eyebrows went up after reading just the first three paragraphs. _Directed to rendezvous with Orb Task Force 15,_ he read with interest, _currently rounding Cape Horn… A small fleet commanded by Commodore Yuna Roma Seiran, intended to cooperate with the Earth Alliance in the routing and/or destruction of ZAFT forces in the Black Sea region…_

After reading the entire document, Neo leaned back in his chair, frowning in thought. _So… they've finally decided to use Orb forces, huh? That could have interesting consequences, both in the long and short-term. And Yuna Seiran… couldn't they have sent a commander who actually knows what he's doing?_

Then he smiled thinly, as something else occurred to him. _On the other hand… now I finally have the chance to show him my "appreciation" for how his idiotic actions unleashed the Crimson Tiger again._

Neo found that, whatever his problems with his new orders might be, he _was_ looking forward to the opportunity to deck Yuna Seiran for that particular piece of stupidity.

* * *

"I wonder what new mission will be," Heine mused, as he and Athrun made their way to _Minerva_'s briefing room. "We've been sidelined here in Diocuia for longer than I would've expected, considering how much importance the Chairman seems to have attached to _Minerva_'s participation in the war effort."

"I guess we're about to find out," Athrun said with a shrug. "If I had to guess, though, we're not the first to hear about it; considering _Dominion_'s presence…"

"Hm… point. They've probably been discussing things already…" Refreshingly, from Athrun's point of view, Heine had no problem at all with _Dominion_ accompanying them; having seen the ship in action during the Second Battle of Jachin Due, he seemed more intrigued by the idea of fighting with them than anything else.

Their brief conversation ended a few moments later, as they stepped through the briefing room hatch… where, to the surprise of neither pilot, Talia already awaited them, along with Arthur Trine and Natarle Badgiruel. _Guess I was right about _Dominion_already knowing about the situation, _Athrun thought to himself. _Which means… Kevin almost certainly does, too._

Exactly what that knowledge might lead to, Athrun wasn't sure he wanted to know. Kevin's preference for direct action could be… inconvenient, from time to time.

"Glad you both could make it," Talia greeted as they entered, and motioned for the pilots to sit. "Captain Badgiruel is already aware of the situation, but you two and Arthur aren't, so I'll take this from the top." She activated the wall display behind her. "As you've no doubt already surmised, we've finally received new orders."

"I take it we're heading out, Captain?" Heine questioned, eyebrow raised.

She nodded. "That's right. And not just us; this operation will require heavy forces, which is one reason we were quickly given authorization to share this information with _Dominion._ We, and all ZAFT forces in the area not required for garrison duty, are being ordered to move out toward the Sea of Marmara, to engage Earth Alliance forces in that region."

Athrun nodded slowly, taking in the map Talia had brought up on the display. _Marmara… the link between the Black and Aegean Seas… makes sense._ "Making a breakout toward the Mediterranean?" he hazarded.

"Exactly," Natarle confirmed. "I believe the eventual goal is to reach Crete; beyond that, though, I'm not certain as of yet."

"Nor am I," Talia admitted, "but I suspect Natarle is right. Crete, however, isn't our problem yet; first we need to reach the Aegean in the first place, and to do that, we need to go through the Earth Alliance forces in Marmara."

"Sounds reasonably simple," Trine said slowly, scratching his head. "With the kind of forces we have with us…"

Natarle grimaced. "Sorry, Arthur, but I don't think it'll be that simple. I received a report this morning from Colonel Walker, suggesting that they've gathered greater forces than we had previously anticipated, possibly indicating an attempt on their part to reclaim the Black Sea region from ZAFT control."

"…It makes sense," Athrun said slowly. "They've suffered a few hammer blows recently, as well as that unexplained attack on a Eurasian base a few weeks back, but after we've been resting this long…"

"Yes," Talia concurred. "By now, they've very likely recovered sufficiently to try and retake the initiative. That's one reason for our current operation."

"I can see that," Heine mused. "So what's our current course?"

She touched the display controls, highlighting a waterway connected to Marmara. "The plan as of now is to make for the Dardanelle Straight and attack any Earth Forces units there; if we can break through at that point, we should have a clear path to Marmara." Talia hesitated. "There is, however, one fact of which you should be aware, Commander."

Athrun tilted his head, an icy feeling starting in his gut. "…What fact might that be?" he asked warily.

"Another part of Colonel Walker's report," Talia said quietly. "According to his intelligence sources, Orb Task Force 15 is moving to reinforce the Earth Alliance at Marmara even as we speak. And if that's the case… we won't be able to avoid engaging them. The only way to go is right through them."

Heine watched curiously as Athrun's gaze turned distant. _He was with Orb for a long time,_ the blonde pilot though to himself. _Will he be able to separate himself from past loyalties?_

For his part, Athrun's internal war was far less violent than Heine might've expected. _I knew this had to happen sometime,_ he told himself. _From the moment I heard about the treaty between Orb and the Earth Alliance, I knew it would eventually come to this. And now that it has… there's no other way. I can't turn back now… and this is Seiran's responsibility, not ours._

"I understand, Captain," he said at last. "I don't like it… but I'll do what I have to." His emerald gaze was firm, his decision made. "I won't shoot to kill if I can avoid it –a lot of those people were my friends- but I won't let my personal feelings get in the way, either. Yuna Seiran and his father brought them into this, not us, and it doesn't change what _we_ have to do."

* * *

Within hours, _Minerva_ and _Dominion_ had finally completed preparations, and lifted back into the sky at last, departing Diocuia after over a week in port.

In some ways, _Minerva_'s crew was reluctant to leave behind the period of respite… yet in others, it was almost a relief to them. They were soldiers in the middle of a war, and they'd been idle too long for their peace of mind.

For those aboard _Dominion,_ feelings were also mixed, but for very different reasons. Combat was not something any of her crew had any particular aversion to –if they did, they wouldn't have still been serving on a ship belonging to Kevin Walker- yet they were all aware, from Natarle Badgiruel down to the cooks, of the fact that it had been over two years since the last time they stepped onto a battlefield. _Minerva_'s pilots and crew members were comparatively green, having faced fewer –and far less stressful- battles than _Dominion_'s people… but the ZAFT soldiers had more _recent_ combat experience.

Not that they were going to let that stop them. With the devious, unflappable Natarle in command, cybernetic assassin John Tyler at fire control, and a small complement of Force Operation X agents for pilots, they felt reasonably confident of their success.

"Back to the battlefield, huh, John?" Natarle mused on _Dominion_'s Bridge, as the ship slowly gained altitude. "It's been a while…"

"Yeah," the armored soldier standing at her side agreed. Technically, of course, they'd both fought very recently indeed… but there was a world of difference between an assassination attempt and a full-on fleet action. "I only pray that it doesn't turn out the way our last engagement did…"

The black-haired woman glanced up at him with a faint smile. "Well," she said dryly, "unless they have a gamma ray cannon, I don't think we need to worry about _that_ kind of damage. I don't think the Earth Forces currently have any mobile forces with anywhere near the firepower to take out that much of the ship in one shot."

"True," Invictus conceded. "Still, you never know… Gai Murakumo uses a miniature Lohengrin with one of the Blue Frame's configurations… I guess you're probably right, though. Not even the Earth Forces would be _that_ crazy."

"And even if they were," Meryl Steiglitz put in from the helm, "I think we'd notice in time to dodge this time. Mirage Colloid isn't quite so practical in atmosphere, and so far as we've been able to determine, they've not yet been able to refine the N-jammer design into hyper jammers."

"Which is fortunate," Natarle agreed. "Mirage Colloid at least has a time limit on it; employing a hidden weapon in that fashion takes a lot of finesse. What ZAFT managed with GENESIS at Jachin was nothing more than a fluke."

A snort came from behind them. "Pretty impressive 'fluke' if you ask me," Jack Carter remarked, stepping onto the Bridge. "All it did was vaporize an entire Earth Alliance fleet and blow up Ptolemaeus base, after all."

Invictus turned his –for once unarmored- head toward his fellow clone. "Got something to say, Jack?" he said mildly. "Or did you just feel it was time to deliver your daily dose of cynicism?"

"I prefer to call it 'realism'," Carter said, with a half-smile. "But actually, I _was_ kind of wondering about something: what are the odds Walker and the _Archangel_ decide to intervene in the upcoming battle?"

It was, Natarle knew, a valid question. Under other circumstances, she would've been absolutely certain… but given the many and varied other concerns _Archangel_ had at this point; most notably the stolen Foxhound, it was a somewhat more interesting question…

"I think they'll be along," she said finally. "Unless Carnehan interferes directly, and gives _Archangel_ a more immediate problem, I think Cagalli will insist on intervening, because of the presence of Orb forces."

Carter nodded slowly. "I suppose that makes sense," he murmured. "But speaking of Orb forces… what are the chances Old Man Onishi participates himself?"

"Hard to say," Invictus answered, frowning in thought; he, too, had heard of Onishi's recent public return to Orb. "It depends on several factors… like just how important Kevin's death is at this point in time. It's possible that he's chosen to try and finish the job ASAP… but I think it more likely that he's going to use Yuna's absence to begin cementing his position in Orb again."

The implacable hatred for John Tyler Onishi was one thing all three "brothers" had in common, as did Natarle, Meryl, and just about everyone else associated with Kevin, Invictus, or Carter. In Kevin's case –and Invictus'- it was due to a long series of events, culminating in Frank Castile's murder; for Carter, it was anger at the virus running rampant through his own body, and utter fury at the near-destruction of his entire organization. As far as he knew, only his loyal crew on _D'Artangan_ remained alive, and for that, he had determined that even working with Kevin Walker was a small enough price to pay for eliminating John Tyler Onishi.

"Well, ain't that just grand," Carter observed now… and no one disagreed with him.

* * *

_Sunrise,_ Athrun thought, gazing up at the sky from _Minerva_'s observation deck. Like Kevin, he, too, found the new shades in the sky to be disconcerting, and more than a little saddening… and, like Kevin, he knew the old blue wouldn't return in his lifetime. _But… that's not what's really bothering me…_

He hadn't been pleased to hear about Orb's involvement in the upcoming battle. It hadn't really _surprised_ him –he'd known long since that it was inevitable- but that didn't change his mixed feelings about having to face Orb soldiers on the battlefield.

_Even in the last war, I never had to do that,_ he thought to himself. _By the time Orb got involved directly, I had already made the decision to break away from ZAFT; the closest I came to fighting "Orb soldiers" was Kevin, and he never considered himself to be truly part of _any_ faction…_

"Thinking about Orb?"

Athrun blinked, startled out of his reverie, and turned to see Heine stepping onto the deck behind him. "How did you know?"

Heine shrugged. "It wasn't exactly hard to guess. For all that you said you were fine with it yesterday, I somehow don't think it's _that_ easy for you. You fought alongside a lot of those people during the last war, didn't you?"

"I did," the blue-haired pilot admitted. "Well, I wouldn't say 'a lot'; the only Orb forces that participated much were the _Kusanagi_'s crew, after all. But yeah, I served with Orb soldiers back then, and got to know a lot of them between the wars."

The other pilot nodded slowly, expression unusually serious. "And you don't want to fight them." It wasn't a question, and he didn't bother to wait for a reply before continuing. "So, Athrun… which country _would_ you like to fight?"

Athrun tilted his head, eyes wary. "…Meaning?" he said cautiously.

"Meaning that, oftentimes, you can't pick and choose your enemies," Heine said bluntly. "If you hesitate on the battlefield because you don't want to fight them, you won't survive it. Falter for one second, and it's all over."

"You think I don't know that?" Athrun questioned, hands tensing. "I nearly got killed more than one by Kira and Kevin during the last war because of that; if Kira hadn't been just as reluctant as I was, and if Cagalli hadn't kept Kevin in check, I _would_ have. But," he went on, "that doesn't make this any easier, Heine. Especially when I know that the only reason Orb is involved in this at all is because of the treason of the Seiran family. The troops aren't to blame for this, Heine. They're just doing their duty."

Heine nodded seriously. "I know that. That's one reason I believed you when you said Kevin Walker isn't a menace: you know Orb's soldiers, and if you say they're honorable, then without evidence to the contrary I'm perfectly willing to accept that. But that doesn't change the fact that _we_ have to do our duty, too… and that if we stop for even one moment to regret what we're doing, we won't have another moment." He met Athrun's eyes levelly. "If you're as good a soldier as they say, Athrun, then remember something, in case the long peace made you forget: regret what you have to do if you must… but _after_ the battle. Emotions like that have no place on the battlefield itself. In the chaos of a firefight, regrets will only get you killed."

* * *

Neo Roanoke stood as Yuna Roma Seiran, freshly arrived with Orb TF 15, was escorted into the conference room on the _John Paul Jones._

Before anyone spoke, Neo took a moment to size up the Orb noble… and behind his mask, his eyebrows went up in what a casual observer might've mistaken for polite disbelief. _Natty uniform,_ he thought, mildly disgusted simply by the sight of the man wearing a military uniform. _Seeing him in person, suddenly I'm not so surprised by what happened a few weeks ago. This… this slimy, gutless excuse for a human being… not to mention stupid… Walker would've done us all a favor by removing him from the equation entirely. Preferably permanently._

"Hello, Captain," Yuna greeted, holding out his hand. "I'm Commodore Yuna Roma Seiran. It's a pleasure to be working with you."

"Captain Neo Roanoke," Neo said in turn, shaking the hand. "I expect we have a lot to discuss. But first, there's something else that needs to be taken care of, if you don't mind."

Yuna blinked, puzzled. "What's that, Captain?"

"This." Neo's gloved hand clenched into a fist, and crashed into the noble's jaw, propelling him back into the now-closed hatch with punishing force.

Stunned, Yuna reeled for several moments, one hand instinctively moving to rub his jaw –which was already tender from the break Kevin Walker had caused, years before- while he tried desperately to recover both his wits and his equilibrium.

It was, perhaps, fortunate for his peace of mind that he didn't notice the carefully bland expressions of the other Earth Alliance personnel present… or the flicker of satisfaction in the eyes of the Orb officer who'd accompanied him from _Takemikazuchi._

Or, for that matter, the fact that his long recovery time confirmed to Neo's satisfaction Yuna's lack of worth as a soldier.

When Yuna finally did recover both his balance and his ability to speak coherently, he stared at Neo in utter incomprehension. _"What did you do that for?"_ he demanded, shocked that Neo would actually do such a thing to an ally… or to an Orb nobleman. "I demand an explanation!"

"That was for your complete and utter stupidity," Neo said calmly. "Do you have any idea how difficult you've made my job, My Lord? You've single-handedly caused me more trouble than any dozen ZAFT officers ever have, and that includes _Minerva."_

Yuna stared, shock replaced with even more complete incomprehension than before. "What are you talking about?"

Neo sighed. "The small matter, My Lord, that it was _your_ risky decision to attempt to marry Orb's chief representative that brought back a certain individual named Kevin Walker. Before you made that ill-advised decision, the Crimson Tiger was safely buried beneath Onishi's consciousness, but you just had to make him mad enough to wake up the sleeping tiger. Now, I'll admit that in the grand scheme of things, he really is only one man… but he's one man with a serious grudge against the Atlantic Federation, and the power to do something about it. _That,_ My Lord, is why I hit you, and you should be glad my superiors are serious about this 'alliance', or else I might do something worse."

_Although,_ the masked captain admitted privately, _I have to admit that scaring you out of your mind is probably more satisfying than simply having you shot would be._

After several more seconds of staring blankly, Yuna finally regained something resembling composure. "That was completely out of line, Captain," he said quietly. "I assure you that my father is going to hear about this, and a formal complaint will be registered with your superiors."

"I'm sure," Neo said dryly, unconcerned. _Obviously, he doesn't quite understand that "my superiors" value me just a bit more than they do a spineless dweeb like him…_

"I hope so," Yuna told him… and then glanced away. "Perhaps reawakening Onishi's Walker personality was… unwise," he said, with manifest unwillingness. "It was not, however, something that any of us could've anticipated… and I suggest that what's done is done." Gradually straightening to something resembling the confident posture he'd had when he entered, he met Neo's gaze squarely. "If we can put that behind us… I believe I have an idea for defeating the ZAFT forces as they pass through the Dardanelle Straight."

Neo gazed at him speculatively. _More likely one of your military subordinates,_ he thought to himself, _since you, it would appear, have about as much tactical brilliance as your average snail. Nonetheless, I don't really care _who_ the idea comes from, if it should happen to be sound…_ "All right, then. Let's hear it."

* * *

_Minerva_ approached the Straight of Dardanelle, _Dominion_ keeping station to port, and ZAFT and Prometheus officers alike knew battle was no more than a few minutes away. The enemy had not yet been spotted, but it was a certainty that they were out there.

Therefore, pilots on both ships quickly began to suit up, while mechanics prepared their mobile suits for launch. Most of _Dominion_'s machines were being kept in reserve for this battle, to delay the revelation of the mass-production Stormhawks, but Jack Carter prepared to sortie in ZGMF-X09A Justice, while Athrun Zala and Shinn Asuka similarly prepared for launch on the _Minerva._

As they suited up in the pilots' locker room on _Minerva,_ Athrun glanced curiously at Shinn. The younger pilot seemed even more taciturn than usual, visibly tense… and, perhaps, angry. _And… eager?_ Athrun thought to himself. _Of course… after those battles out in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, he's hoping Kevin will turn up again… so that this time, he can bring down Nemesis. But the rest…_

Fastening his collar, Athrun finally turned to face the black-haired pilot. "What's wrong, Shinn?" he asked evenly, suspecting what part of it was, but uncertain about the rest.

Shinn fastened his own collar, not bothering to look at his commander. "Isn't it obvious?" he said shortly. "What with the opposition we're expecting."

Athrun nodded in comprehension. _It figures that it would be that. It's the one subject that bothers him nearly as much as Kevin's existence…_

"I can see what you mean," he said aloud, turning to gaze pensively at nothing. "Orb forces… even I can't help thinking that this might never have happened if Cagalli had stayed in Orb, tried to fight the Seirans…"

Shinn snorted, reaching for his helmet. "I doubt it," he said succinctly. "Someone that emotional could never lead a country properly. That's what got her into whatever mess she's in now; that's what got Orb into trouble three years ago. Acting on their emotions… And having Walker by her side would've only made things worse. That bastard has no self-control at all…"

Athrun only barely restrained himself from making a remark about the pot calling the kettle black. _Actually,_ he thought to himself, _he _does_ have self-control… and that's what makes him different from you. He's a ruthless killer when he needs to be, but he also knows when it's _not_ appropriate to act in such a manner. After the way you disobeyed direct orders in the Indian Ocean, I'm not at all sure that the same can be said of you, Shinn._

_And,_ he thought now, as Shinn's other words registered, _I'm not sure you really think of Orb the way you say you do. If you didn't care about Orb, you wouldn't bother getting angry over what Cagalli's done, would you?_

Athrun nodded slowly. "So that's it," he murmured. "You don't really hate Orb at all, do you?"

Shinn looked at him sharply. "What in the world are you talking about, Commander? Of course I hate Orb, for what they've done. I joined ZAFT so that I could at least save one nation from the destruction Orb's leaders caused three years ago; I have nothing but contempt for the people in charge there."

_Yeah… that's what I thought…_ It was all beginning to make sense to Athrun now; ironically, it was largely due to his experience with Kevin Walker's many and varied grudges that he was able to truly understand Shinn's.

"So," he said slowly, "it isn't really Orb you hate at all, is it? You like Orb, but hate their leaders, for not protecting Orb… and for letting your family die."

Shinn stiffened. _No… no, that's not…_ "Ridiculous," he said sharply. "I could never _like_ Orb. Not after all this…" Shaking his head, he tucked his helmet under his arm, and stalked out of the locker room.

Athrun watched him go with a faint smile. _Yes,_ he thought to himself, _that's it, all right. Huh… I wonder if he realizes how much he sounds like Kevin did, trying to deny that he had any trace of altruism, three years ago…_

Chuckling quietly to himself, Athrun picked up his own helmet, and headed for the hangar.

* * *

"Numerous heat signatures dead ahead, Captain," Bart Heim reported tersely. "I don't have complete numbers yet, but it looks to be at least thirty ships. Unable to confirm type, but there are at least two distinct patterns out there."

Talia nodded calmly. "Earth Alliance and Orb forces," she said evenly. "As we expected." She glanced at a communications display. "Are you getting this, Natarle?"

"_Already on it,"_ Natarle confirmed, from _Dominion_'s Bridge. _"Satellite recon from our orbital base indicates about an even split between Orb and Earth Forces… and it looks like the Orb forces are being sent in first."_ She grimaced. _"Entirely predictable tactics on their part."_

"Unfortunately true," Talia agreed. "Also unfortunately, we have no choice but to engage them. I know how Prometheus feels about fighting Orb ships, Natarle, but…"

"_I know,"_ the other woman said quietly. _"We already discussed this, Talia: we'll do what we have to do."_ She glanced off screen. _"Travis, signal Justice to launch immediately… and remind him to follow the ROE."_

"_Will do, Captain,"_ Travis Klein agreed from _Dominion_'s CIC. _"Now reminding Justice's pilot –again- to stick with established Rules of Engagement."_

Talia shook her head, reflecting on how _Dominion_'s command structure made ZAFT look like Nazi Germany, as far as formality went. "Distance to enemy fleet?" she asked after a moment.

"Ten kilometers and closing," Heim replied.

"All right, then." She turned to look at the port side of the Bridge. "Meyrin, instruct Impulse and Savior to launch at once."

"Yes, Ma'am," Meyrin Hawke replied promptly. "Shinn, Commander Zala, launch when ready."

"_Roger that,"_ Athrun acknowledged. _"Athrun Zala, launching!"_

"_Shinn Asuka, Core Splendor heading out!"_

Nodding to herself, Talia turned to face forward again. "Charge Tannhauser," she ordered calmly. "Ready the Tristans, and load missile tubes. Lower Bridge into battle position."

The game was afoot.

* * *

Athrun Zala felt a moment of sheer pleasure as Savior hurtled into the sky. For all the danger that often came with it, he'd always enjoyed flying, and Savior was built for exactly that, its mobile armor mode in particular out-maneuvering almost anything else in the air.

It didn't take long, though, for that to wear off, as the images on his sensor screens grounded him back in reality. "Here they come, Shinn," he called, seeing numerous M1 Astrays and MVF-M11C Murasames lifting off from the Orb carriers ahead of them.

"I see them," Shinn responded, flipping switches and pressing buttons as the Impulse drew itself together into a cohesive whole. "They won't be enough," he added confidently, eyes bright with background anger.

"Just don't get cocky," Athrun warned, shoving aside his own mixed feelings about the entire situation. "Don't underestimate them because they're Naturals; I flew with some fine Orb pilots, three years ago."

"Whatever." Shinn really couldn't care less how good Orb's pilots were. He'd decided that they would fall, and he knew he was more than good enough to ensure that. _This is their reward for what they've done,_ he thought to himself, and smiled thinly as the Force Silhouette backpack connected solidly with the Impulse. _Now let's do this._

Igniting the backpack's powerful main thrusters, Shinn yanked out one of his beam sabers, and rose into the sky to meet the incoming Orb mobile suits.

Athrun, hanging back for the moment, shook his head at his subordinate's eagerness. _One day, that'll get him killed… especially if he gets that fired up about trying to kill Kevin. I'm beginning to wonder if he even knows what caution _is…

"There's one of ZAFT's prototypes," the lead Murasame pilot called, tipping his machine on one wing as he swept toward the Impulse. "Follow me in," he added, opening up with the high-energy beam cannon in his machine's dorsal fin. "We're going to-"

He got off one emerald bolt from his cannon, and then Impulse's blade of scarlet fire drove into the Murasame's nose, melting a hole straight through to the cockpit, and vaporized the pilot on contact.

Shinn withdrew his blade, and the Murasame seemed to stagger in the air, before rolling over and falling almost gently toward the water below, trailing smoke and melted armor.

"Bastard!" the Astray pilot behind the now-dead leader hissed. "Just what _is_ this thing?" Before Impulse could get into range to render the same fate upon him, he snapped up his beam rifle, and spat a trio of emerald darts as fast as the weapon could cycle.

Impulse immediately threw itself to the right, letting one bolt vaporize empty air with a _crack,_ cut power long enough to drop below the second, and snapped its shield into the path of the third, letting it splatter harmlessly into green sparks.

In the interval, Shinn had not been idle. His own rifle came up, and he fired twice in quick succession.

Unlike the Astray, Impulse's shots were fired calmly and precisely. The Astray itself shuddered as the bolt of emerald light pierced its torso, smashing through the outer armor, shattering control systems and power relays like balsa wood… and tearing out the other side, passing through the energy battery along the way. Its containment ruptured, the battery released all its remaining energy at once, ripping out through the surrounding mobile suit in a manner more than violent enough to finish the job the original shot had started.

The second bolt was fully as precise, targeted this time on another Murasame. Unlike the first, though, this seemed at first to do little damage, melting a hole through the front of the torso and blasting out the back…and then the machine simply fell away, its pilot gone from the waist up.

"What was that you said about getting cocky?" Shinn called back to Athrun, smiling as he fired off another shot at the incoming mobile suits.

"That," was all Athrun said in reply.

It was all he needed to say, as even more mobile suits lifted off from the Orb carriers. It was, in fact, every single machine they had, more than replacing the machines Shinn had already destroyed. Before such numbers, even ZGMF-X56S Impulse, even Shinn Asuka, would be quickly swamped.

Unless something changed very drastically, very quickly.

* * *

"How many mobile suits are we looking at, Bart?" Talia asked, face a mask despite her own grave concern at the new development.

"Uncertain, Captain," Heim replied, watching his displays intently. "Some of the heat signatures are too close together to distinguish. But… I'd guess at least forty, maybe more."

She closed her eyes. "That's what I thought… What about the Justice?"

"Currently ignoring the Orb forces entirely," he answered immediately, having anticipated the question. "It appears to be bypassing them, in an attempt to engage the Earth Alliance forces directly."

_Why am I not surprised… not that even the Justice would necessarily be enough to turn the tide here. In Athrun Zala's hands, maybe, but Carter… somehow I doubt he has the kind of combat experience the man he was cloned from has, at least in a mobile suit._

Talia leaned back in her chair, frowning intently. _We need to even the odds. If the Orb fleet has this much firepower to bring to bear, I _don't_ want to face both them and the Earth Forces fleet simultaneously. Which means…_

She didn't really like the option that left to her, but then she frequently didn't like the options she had in a battle. This one was, perhaps, more distasteful than some, but it was nonetheless the only choice she had, if she was going to get her ship and her pilots out of this mess.

"Malik," Talia began, "swing us around to face the Orb fleet directly. Chen, prepare to fire Tannhauser on my command."

Trine turned to look at her in surprise. "Are you sure about that, Captain? The blast damage and radiation-"

"I'm aware of the risks," she told him quietly, "but under the circumstances, I don't see that we have much choice." She glanced at Natarle's image. "Do you concur?"

"_Unfortunately, yes,"_ Natarle said unhappily. _"I'd hoped that certain… other factors would've intervened by this time, but since they haven't… It'll have to be you, though, Talia. Our standing orders strictly forbid an attack of that magnitude against Orb forces unless our own safety absolutely requires it."_ She shrugged. _"I'm afraid that the Colonel, well…"_

"Yes, for all that he's willing to set aside his grudge against ZAFT for now, he still values you more than he does us." Talia nodded in understanding. "Considering that there's no formal alliance involved, and you're his direct subordinates, it only makes sense for him to be loyal first and foremost to his own. It won't be a problem." She turned back to her own people, for now _Minerva_ had come around to the proper bearing. "Are you ready, Chen?"

"Affirmative, Captain," the fire control officer replied. "Ready to fire on your command."

She took a deep breath, hesitating another moment. Then, "Fire Tannhauser."

Both Impulse and Savior broke away from the engagement, flying swiftly out of the line of fire… and the instant they were clear, _Minerva_'s bow glowed white, and discharged a bolt of pure, concentrated destruction.

A fiery bolt with a red-orange core, blue corona, and white static erupted from _Minerva_'s single positron cannon, blasting directly toward the Orb fleet. Against such firepower, the strongest armor in the world was useless; nothing could resist the raw, matter-annihilating power of antimatter.

Except for the equally titanic column of azure light that smashed down from above, directly into the path of _Minerva_'s blast.

Talia instantly shielded her eyes against the glare, as the two opposing antimatter streams collided and expended their energy against one another, most of it bleeding into the surrounding air and water. _What the-?_

"Positron collision!" Heim called unnecessarily, shouting to be heard over the colossal din of the climactic event. "An opposing positron stream from an unknown location-"

"_Unknown?"_ Shinn Asuka exploded over the radio, before the flash had even faded. _"There's only one thing that could've done _that!"

The rage in his voice was the first thing to catch Talia's attention… followed closely by another voice, breaking in on the same frequency. _"Sorry about that,"_ it observed dryly. _"But, much as I'd love to see Yuna Roma Seiran's worthless carcass converted to pure energy, I'd really rather not let you take a bunch of innocent Orb soldiers with him."_

That voice, combined with Shinn's fury, told Talia all that she needed to know… and when Heim brought up on the main display a section of the sky above, she saw exactly what she expected… and more.

Hovering between the ZAFT and Orb forces was MBF-M1000B Nemesis… flanked by a steel-gray mass-produced Stormhawk, ZGMF-X10A Freedom, and MBF-02 Strike Rouge.

The aces of the First Earth/ZAFT War flew together again at last…

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

Amidst the chaos of the new conflict, the Earth Alliance finds itself in need of extra forces –or, as some might suggest, cannon fodder- and so finally brings Orb military forces directly into the war… and as they do, John Tyler Onishi returns to his homeland at last, to further his unknown agenda…

Meanwhile, as ZAFT and the Earth Alliance clash in Europe, the _Archangel_ makes its move at last...

Okay, I know this chapter is _extremely_ late, and I apologize for that. Unfortunately, it was due to matters beyond my control. Two weeks ago, a muscle spasm in my back interrupted my writing completely for several days, and when I finally did get back to it, it took some time for me to return to my usual pace. Add to that the sheer length of the chapter, and you've got on huge delay.

Fortunately, that was a freak incident, and unlikely to occur again anytime soon, so you should see the next chapter of Cry of the Falcon up in a much more reasonable time frame. In the meantime, though, let me know if this chapter was wroth the wait. –Solid Shark


	23. Chapter 23: Gun X Sword

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of**** Destiny, proceed at your own risk**

* * *

Athens, Greece… a city once famous for the grand structure known as the Parthenon, and now famous for that same monument's destruction, in the terrible fury of Break The World. Those who had once visited Athens to see the Parthenon now visited to see the crater that had consumed it and part of downtown Athens. As one visitor sardonically put it, it was one of the Seven Tragic Wonders of the Modern World… though he failed to elaborate on what all of the other six were.

Said visitor now sat in an outdoor café, sipping a complicated concoction involving coffee, rum, and vodka, while waiting patiently for the man he was to meet. Gray of hair and silvery-eyed, he was just under two meters tall and appeared to be in his late teens; only a verified ID had allowed him to purchase the drink in the first place, though in retrospect the proprietor noted the youth's manner was mature beyond his apparent age.

His clothing was somewhat unusual, but not enough to attract lasting attention: combat boots, black trousers and shirt, a black trench coat, and fingerless gloves. In the wartime world, he was nothing more than a momentary curiosity.

_Late,_ the youth mused, glancing lazily at a clock hanging on a nearby building. _But, I suppose, it doesn't matter that much… We always were a patient folk, after all. And under the circumstances, it wouldn't be at all surprising if he's busy…_

A few moments later, though, another youth quietly slipped into the chair across from him. Like the first young man, he appeared to be in his teens… but there the similarity ended. His hair was electric violet, and he wore sunglasses over mismatched eyes, one silver, the other gold. He, too, wore combat boots, but over them were light gray trousers, a crimson shirt, and black vest with a fur-trimmed collar.

"Bit of a switch from our old meeting place, isn't it?" the newcomer observed, glancing around at the city surrounding them. "But then, it's been… how long now since our last meeting, here on Earth?"

"Three years," the first youth responded, taking another sip. "Last time was in Rome, just after Mike's crackup in Banadiya." He grimaced. "As you say, old friend, a 'bit of a switch'… but kind of unavoidable, since our old meeting place got smashed by a chunk of Junius Seven."

"True," the violet-haired youth acknowledged. "A good thing we set up an alternate site… though this one nearly got broken around the edges, too." He smiled faintly. "I see you haven't changed, compadre. Grown a few centimeters, but still the same old sharp-eared… uh…"

"Killer?" the other suggested, with a small smile of his own. "And you haven't changed either, Mark. Your fashion sense is still as loud as hair."

"You wound me," the loud-haired man replied, comically clutching at his heart. "Ah, what wicked fate hath led me here, where one sharp tongue would slay me…" Mark sobered abruptly. "But seriously, Alan… you and I both know why we're here."

Alan sighed, looked up at the sky, and finished off his drink. "…Yeah," he admitted, "I know. You've noticed it, too? That someone's plying the old links?"

Mark snorted. "Hard not to, compadre; you know as well as I do that no one can access the old links without the rest of us knowing. We were meant to be as one, and those traits still exist… First was Kevin, of course, three years ago… and then Mike, before Kevin finished him off. Now we've got, what, at least three others? That Hyperion weirdo, Delta, and whoever it was that was transmitting those cryptic messages to Kevin a few months back."

"Don't forget Alec," Alan reminded him. "We know he's still around."

"True," Mark acknowledged, waving a hand, "but I'm not too sure he even counts. He's spent the time since that day trying to fit back into ZAFT; what happened back there wounded him even more than the rest of us. I'd say it's an open question as to whether or not he'll be coming back at all."

Alan tilted his head, giving his friend a shrewd look. "Even if the Call is issued? You really think even Alec will ignore the Gathering?"

"When you put it that way…" Mark fell silent, considering the matter.

"Of course," Alan mused, when Mark said nothing more, "it looks like you, me, and Alec are the only ones who _are_ waiting for the Call. The others who have resurfaced are acting already; they may not have rejoined Hydra, but they're not just sitting around, either." He shook his head. "When we _do_ finally reform, it's going to be hell in a hand basket, you know that? Us, Hydra, Delta's 'Phase II' freaks, Force Operation X…"

"Yeah," Mark agreed heavily, tilting his chair back. "Not to mention the strong possibility of the Earth Forces creating augment-variants of their own." He sighed. "It's a recipe for total chaos, compadre. Heaven knows the technology involved in our creation is expensive stuff, but even with just the existing variants and a couple of dozen from the Earth Forces, the entire paradigm of conflict could be shifted for decades to come… maybe centuries."

"…I know." Alan closed his eyes, leaning back in his own chair. "Sometimes, I really wish we could go back in time and fry Oracle before he could even dream about creating the ABADDON program. That sadistic, Hitler-reincarnation, Neo Nazi-wannabe has brought about more chaos than almost anybody else in the last century…"

"Not just him," Mark reminded him. "This craziness started a good twenty years ago, with Redemption; that's what laid the groundwork for Oracle's lunacy."

Alan sighed. "True…" Shaking his head, he leaned forward again. "So, what do you think, compadre? All hell's broken loose already; you think we should get involved now?"

Mark shook his head. "Neg," he said succinctly. "It's chaotic enough out there as it is. I say we wait for the Call. Right now, all we'd do is confuse things even more, and I don't think Kevin really needs that. You with me?"

"Affirm," the other said reluctantly. "But we should still be prepared at any time, Chimera," he added, using his friend's old name at last. "You, me, and Basilisk are the only surviving players in this piece who haven't gotten fully dragged into it, but we're bound to sooner or later. You know as well as I do that the Call _will_ come."

"Affirm," Chimera agreed. "I'd no intention of slacking off either, Minotaur. Matter of fact, I'm thinking of trying a hit on the Phase II HQ."

Minotaur's eyebrows went up… and then he slowly smiled. "Let Delta know she's not gonna get any help from the true Abaddon, eh? …I like it." He stood then. "You ever get that raid planned out, compadre, contact me, got it?"

"Affirm," Chimera said, grinning. He stood as well, and briefly clasped his friend's hand. And during the clasp, he sent a brief message across their receptor contact. _"One day, compadre, the true Abaddon will have their revenge… and redemption."_

Then the two parted, and briskly walked off in opposite directions, never looking back.

* * *

Shinn Asuka, pilot of ZGMF-X56S Impulse, stared at the new arrivals with bitter rage burning in his heart. _Again,_ he thought, fury coloring even his thoughts. _That bastard Walker dares to interfere _again_… and this time he's brought help?_

Before he could snap at the interlopers, Talia Gladys' voice came over the speakers. _"Would you mind explaining just what it is that you're doing here, Colonel?"_ she demanded. _"I've understood your actions in the past, but what you just did-"_

"Better than the alternative," Kevin Walker retorted. "If I hadn't been here, the only choices would've been to let the Orb ships –only here because of Seiran's betrayal- be destroyed, or disable your Tannhauser. As it happens, I'm no happier about this situation than you are, but we couldn't allow you to just kill those poor souls without at least _trying_ to call the whole thing off."

"_And if you can't?"_ Talia questioned, somewhat mollified. _"If you can't convince the Orb ships to break off, what then?"_

In Nemesis' cockpit, Kevin's expression hardened. "Then I'll do what I have to," he said, eyes jade ice. "So will Kira and Cagalli."

"As will I," Leona Colde interjected from her Stormhawk. "Which reminds me…" She glanced over at the Strike Rouge. "My Lady, I hereby request permission to strafe _Takemikazuchi_'s Bridge."

"Sorry, Leona," Cagalli Yula Athha said regretfully, "but there's more than just Yuna on that ship… and even if there wasn't, killing him would be too hard to justify. If it wasn't, Kevin would've already done it."

Leona pondered that for a moment. "In that case… permission to scare him out of his mind?"

"Permission granted," Cagalli answered with a laugh. "But," she added, sobering, "give me a minute. This probably won't do any good, but I need to at least try to get them to break off."

"If you insist," the ex-NGSF soldier said with a theatrical sigh.

"The Orb units are coming back, Cagalli," Kira warned, spinning Freedom away from _Minerva_ and back toward Task Force 15. "If you're gonna do it, better do it now."

"Right." Cagalli took a deep breath. "Attention, all Orb forces in this area. This is Cagalli Yula Athha, Chief Representative of Orb. As of this moment, I am hereby countermanding your orders from Yuna Roma Seiran…"

As she spoke, Shinn's gaze flickered between Strike Rouge and Nemesis, and his hands clenched on his controls. _Those bastards,_ he thought angrily. _Those meddling bastards… first Walker, now even the Freedom and the heir to the Athha?_

Not far away, Athrun Zala sat in the cockpit of ZGMF-X23S Savior… and, though his reasons were very different, he, too, found himself wondering what the quartet of mobile suits were doing there… especially after the distinctive form of the _Archangel_ burst out of the water, sweeping in from the Orb Task Force's flank. _I knew Kevin thinks he's obligated to help protect _Minerva,_ but this…?_ Athrun shook his head. _Just what do they think they can accomplish by doing this, anyway? I mean, it's a good thing we didn't end up destroying that fleet after all, but what in the world are they doing now?_

_And… how long before Shinn uses this as an excuse to try and fry Kevin?_

* * *

On the Bridge of the _John Paul Jones,_ Neo Roanoke's eyes narrowed behind his mask. _"…As of this moment, I am hereby countermanding your orders from Yuna Roma Seiran,"_ he heard from the Bridge speakers. _"This action is completely unacceptable; the presence of Task Force 15 in this battle does absolutely nothing to serve Orb's interests or security. Even with the WSTO agreement, there is no reason for Orb forces to be engaging ZAFT when the homeland is not in danger, imminent or otherwise; therefore, I am ordering you to break off the engagement and leave this area entirely."_

Closing his eyes for a moment, Neo reminded himself that, while he had managed to get away with decking the supercilious nobleman, killing him outright would doubtless leave a very poor impact on diplomatic relations. _Much as I'd love to,_ he thought acidly, and punched a button on the arm of his chair, switching transmission frequencies. "Commodore Seiran," he said in a flat, dangerous voice, suppressing his disgust only with great difficulty, "could you explain this to me, please?"

A part of him was amused when the first sounds to come over the radio were incoherent sputtering… but that amusement vanished an instant later, as Cagalli's voice came over the speakers again. _"Attention, all Orb forces in this area,"_ she repeated, voice harder than before. _"This is Chief Representative Cagalli Yula Athha. You are hereby ordered to cease hostilities against ZAFT forces in this region, and return to Orb waters by the most expeditious route. If you continue the engagement, I will have no choice but to order your ships and mobile suits forcibly disabled. I don't want to do that, but if it's the only way to stop your participation in this battle, I won't hesitate… and neither will Colonel Walker."_

Neo raised a hand to his forehead. _Well, that tears it,_ he thought, almost calmly. _She's invoked the name of Kevin Walker… who, for all that just about everybody in the entire solar system wants him dead, is known even to his worst enemies to lie only to preserve his own secrets. In a matter like this, his honesty is unquestioned by even the late Muruta Azrael or Patrick Zala… blast that idiot Yuna for setting him loose._

Forcing himself to remain calm, he tapped his communications panel again. "Well, Commodore Seiran? If you've got an explanation, I'd be very interested in-"

"_This is Colonel Kevin Walker,"_ a flat voice interrupted, _"Force Operation X commanding officer… formerly Baron Kevin Onishi, reserve Colonel, Orb Union Mobile Suit Corps. I no longer have any authority over Orb forces, but I_ do _continue to act as the Chief Representative's bodyguard, as well as pilot of MBF-M1000B Nemesis. As such, I am prepared to support her orders… so before you decide to follow through with fighting alongside the same people who scorched Orb three years ago, I suggest you all keep that in mind."_

"And that's that," Neo murmured aloud, as confusion spread throughout the Orb mobile suit ranks. "No one would ever accuse _him_ of consorting with ZAFT for no reason… Yuna Seiran, you should be hoping you have another card up your sleeve, or else you may not live to see tomorrow…"

* * *

"We appear to have them very confused," Leona remarked, sweeping Stormhawk's gaze across the Orb forces. "How many of them believed us, do you think?"

"A fair number, probably," Kevin replied, keeping his attention discretely fixed on the Impulse. "Problem is, they may not be able to afford to _act_ on that belief; not if my read of the situation is as accurate as I think it is."

"Meaning?" Cagalli demanded, turning to look at Nemesis.

"Meaning," Kira answered for him, "that if they try to break off, the Earth Forces might attack _them,_ too." He sighed. "I'm sorry, Cagalli, but one way or the other, we're probably going to have to fight here. Otherwise, I don't think they'll be able to obey the withdrawal order, even if Yuna can be convinced to give it in the first place."

"He's just the sort to waffle, too," Kevin observed, using rear optics to glance briefly at _Takemikazuchi._ "In fact, it would appear he already is; it's been ninety seconds already since _my_ transmission, and that brainless wonder hasn't gotten out a coherent sentence yet…"

The fact didn't really surprise any of them. In addition to the problems they already knew he had with taking strong action, the _Archangel_ had also received word of John Tyler Onishi's return to Orb. That event, while making Kevin's blood boil –and causing him to once again openly state his patricidal intentions- had also improved their morale somewhat, Cagalli's in particular.

After all, with Sahaku and Athha already against them, having the elder Baron Onishi back was certain to hamper Unato Ema Seiran's efforts… and drive the already twitchy Yuna almost insane from sheer paranoia.

Watching the quartet calmly await the Task Force's response, Shinn Asuka's hands clenched on his controls. "Just what do you think you're doing here, Walker?" he demanded. "Why do you always have to interfere?"

Kevin glanced at him with something akin to contempt. "You know, Asuka," he said conversationally, "if sheer righteous fury could accomplish anything worthwhile, wolverines would've inherited the world long ago." Before the younger pilot –practically vibrating with anger now- could explode, he continued, "The simple fact is that I don't care to see my countrymen blown to pieces by you if I can possibly do anything about it. True, I don't actually have much feeling toward my country –my allegiance is to my friends, not to any nation- but I don't like it when soldiers are made into dupes… and Cagalli wants it this way."

_Athha, Athha, Athha… it always leads back to Athha! Put the two together…_ "One thing you need to learn sometime, Walker," Shinn hissed. "If you keep interfering, I'll finish you off for good!"

"Bold words," Kevin observed, lifting his twin buster rifle for inspection. "Unfortunately, while your skill –when you can hang onto your temper- is impressive, I'm afraid your mobile suit leaves me highly unimpressed. Considering its modular nature… As a friend of mine once described an earlier mobile suit I flew, Impulse is held together by duct tape and chicken wire. Oh, and happy thoughts for good measure." He frowned. "No, on second thought, I don't think there are happy thoughts anywhere _near_ that cockpit…"

"Just shut up!" Shinn snapped. "Or else-"

"_Attention, all Task Force 15 ships,"_ Yuna's voice called over the radio, interrupting Shinn's burst of anger. _"Ignore all instructions from Strike Rouge. That pilot… that pilot is-"_ Having begun his sentence strongly, he had apparently lost whatever idea he had regarding an explanation. He cleared his throat audibly, then burst out, _"The pilot claiming to be Cagalli Yula Athha is nothing more than an imposter!"_

In Strike Rouge's cockpit, Cagalli blinked. _He has the gall to call me an _imposter?

Within Nemesis, Kevin's fist clenched. "An imposter, is she?" he said loudly over the radio. "Would I, Kevin Walker, really support an imposter, you brainless passenger pigeon? Say that again and I'll stick my buster rifle-"

(_Careful, Kevin,_) Kira interrupted hastily over their link. (_No need to get, uh, _that_ personal. I think you got your point across when you called him a passenger pigeon._)

(_Oh, all right,_) Kevin grumbled. (_At least I didn't shoot him outright!_)

"Sounds like you made an impression, mon ami," Leona observed, listening in on Orb transmissions. "Your reputation for honesty precedes you." _Although,_ she thought with a faint smile, _not as much as your reputation for violence. I rather suspect everyone who heard that transmission is quite sure you really _would_ like to reverse Yuna's digestion with a buster rifle shot…_

Kevin, listening himself, smiled. "Well," he mused to Cagalli, "at least they believe _I'm_ who I say I am."

"Well, of course they do," she retorted, smiling herself… though her expression was more savage, after hearing Yuna dismiss her as an imposter. "Think about it, Kevin: who in their right mind would want to impersonate _you?_ You've got more enemies than anyone else on the planet!" She shook her head fondly. "Well, let's see him try to trump _that_ one."

A few moments later, Yuna attempted to do just that.

"_Ignore the instructions from Nemesis,"_ he said flatly, voice stronger this time as his long-standing feud with Kevin lent him resolve. _"'Colonel Walker's reputation for honesty may be well-known… but I would remind you all that he cares far more for his own interests than for Orb's. If employing an impersonator of my wife is what he needs to accomplish his goals, then I have no doubt he'd use one."_ His voice hardened more. _"Therefore, we _will_ continue according to plan."_

"Well," Leona observed, as Kevin's blood began to boil, "he may have actually found a working tactic… even if he's signed his own death warrant in the process."

Cagalli, seeing Nemesis begin to tremble in sync with Kevin's anger, couldn't disagree with the ex-NGSF soldier.

* * *

"Just what is _that_ all about?" Todaka demanded, shock and anger breaking through even his usual respect for his country's nobility. "My Lord, you know as well as I do that Strike Rouge is _not_ piloted by an imposter… and who would believe that Colonel Walker would allow such a thing in the first place?"

"I had no choice," Yuna retorted, and waved a hand toward the waiting Earth Alliance naval forces. "Think about it, Captain: there's an entire _fleet_ of Earth Forces warships out there. What do you think they'd do to us if we broke off the attack? We _must_ continue fighting!" He shook his head. "And as for Walker, I think quite a few people will be willing to accept it. His use of… questionable tactics –at least in the past- is well known, and I should remind you that his break with Cagalli prior to her abduction was anything but unknown!"

Todaka seethed inwardly, but had to grant Yuna's point… with the utmost reluctance. It was, after all, true that Kevin Walker –then Onishi- had broken with Cagalli rather publicly; the incident itself had been private, but the aftermath had been impossible to hide. Under the circumstances, those who didn't know him personally –and not even the majority of _Orb_ soldiers did- might well believe that his break ran deep enough to permit him to act in such a fashion.

_And I also can't deny that we'd likely be sunk in short order if the Earth Alliance thought we were turning on them,_ he thought sourly. _All because of that treaty… If only Colonel Walker and Lady Cagalli had been able to remain in Orb to fight it._

As it was, though, Todaka knew that their hopes still rested with the two exiled nobles… and the rogue Mobile Assault Ship _Archangel._ If Orb was ever to be freed from its present status as an "ally" of the Earth Alliance, it was _Archangel_ and _her_ allies that would pull it off.

_And in the meantime,_ Todaka thought, with a carefully hidden, bitter smile, _there's no chance even our finest Murasame pilots will bring _that_ quartet down. Strike Rouge is relatively weak, but Freedom is the most famous machine around –for good reason- that steel machine is clearly a variant on the old Stormhawk… and if mass destruction becomes the only answer, I can think of no better man –or machine- for the job than Colonel Walker and the Nemesis._

_In the meantime… I will do my duty, however painful it may be._

"Very well, My Lord," Todaka heard himself say. "We'll proceed as planned." He pressed a key on his armrest, bringing up communications again himself. "All mobile suits, this is Captain Todaka, on _Takemikazuchi,"_ he said calmly, allowing no trace of hesitation into his voice. "Continue the operation. The mission is to destroy the _Minerva_ and all attached forces. For now, ignore _Dominion_ unless fired upon, but otherwise engage at will." He took a breath. "And… Godspeed. Todaka, clear."

After he'd closed down communications again, Yuna looked at him curiously. "You're ordering them to avoid combat with _Dominion?"_ he said quizzically, more puzzled than angered.

Todaka nodded. "They're avoiding hostilities at this time, My Lord; probably to avoid conflict of interest, or possibly simply because they don't want to reveal their full capabilities yet. Either way, they're currently no threat… and I, for one, have no desire to send our pilots up against the threat she represents. Under the command of an Orb national or not, Prometheus is undoubtedly a ruthless organization, with goals beyond protecting Orb. If we presented them with a genuine threat, they'd swat us as easily as an exterminator killing flies, and with about as much hesitation."

The nobleman frowned. "You really think they're that dangerous?"

His nominal subordinate hid a sigh of resignation. "My Lord, Kevin Walker is one of the most experienced soldiers in the entire Earth Sphere, who has gone through the best training available to anyone in his line of work… and happens to possess an IQ approaching 200. I believe it's safe to assume, My Lord, that he'll have recruited the best for Prometheus, and put the holdovers from _Dominion_'s original crew through the most strenuous training he could devise. Given all that, I consider _Dominion_ to be a _far_ greater threat than _Minerva,_ if we should irritate her."

Yuna winced, both at the reminder of his rival's skill and the truth of Todaka's statement. "I concede the point, Captain. In fact, given the… discussion Captain Roanoke and I had over Walker, I believe the Earth Forces fleet will also grant the point."

"_I do indeed, Commodore,"_ Neo said over the heretofore forgotten link with the _John Paul Jones._ _"As a matter of fact, I highly approve of your decision to leave them be. We can engage them _after_ we down _Minerva,_ if it comes to it… though to be perfectly honest, I'd rather not engage them at all."_ On the display, the masked man grimaced. _"I recall Muruta Azrael's fate… and the _Archangel_'s stubborn tendency to survive against all odds. Engaging one of those ships will be quite a challenge enough, I think."_

"So you intend to engage the _Archangel_'s forces?" Yuna asked, a touch of anxiety in his voice.

Neo shrugged. _"I don't think _our_ intentions particularly matter, Commodore. Knowing Walker, I don't doubt he'll be engaging _us_ soon enough. Therefore…"_ He glanced off-screen. _"As soon as Task Force 15's Murasames go out, launch ours, as well. All of them."_

Neo turned back to Yuna then… but before he could speak, Cagalli's voice came over the radio again. _"If that's your decision,"_ she said flatly, _"then we have no choice."_ She paused a beat. _"Kevin: go."_

* * *

On _Minerva_'s Bridge, Talia watched the brief standoff with a mix of confusion and gratitude; the former over the sudden, complete pause in the battle, and the latter for the breathing space that gave her ship and mobile suits.

"Well," she remarked to no one in particular, "at least this gives us time to regroup… and for Carter to reach his own target…"

"Something of a lunatic, if you ask me," a Ukrainian-accented voice said with a snort. "I never ran into him at Lab –he was only there for a few days before being shipped out- but I've heard of his actions since. The mutiny on the former _Tesla,_ his solo attacks against Hydra in Orb and at Mendel… He's a loose cannon, that one."

"Perhaps," Talia conceded, glancing at the new arrival. Neatly dressed in her typical coal-black uniform, Natalya Arkanian had clearly arrived only because her former student was involved in the battle. "On the other hand, there's no denying that he can do some genuine damage, from time to time. He performed well enough during Break The World, if you'll recall."

"True…" Arkanian shook his head. "Well, my young student's arrival should make up for any deficiencies on Carter's part, anyway. I'm not entirely familiar with how his 'ZERO system' works –and for that matter, I'm fairly sure _he_ doesn't entirely understand, either- but it does seem to work. Combine that with Nemesis' raw maneuverability and firepower, and you've got a true force to be reckoned with." She shook her head. "Unfortunate, though, that he refuses to _use_ that power in a truly responsible manner…"

Talia looked at her shrewdly. "Still trying to draw him back into the fold?"

"It's where he belongs," the ex-mercenary said simply, not even glancing at the captain. "Among his own kind, not mere hu- rather, among those who couldn't possibly understand him the way other Destroyers can."

_Mere humans,_ Talia thought to herself, easily catching what Arkanian had almost said. _Yes, it figures that people such as yourselves would consider yourselves beyond humans… I imagine even Colonel Walker does, to a certain extent._ She hid a grimace. _But much as I may sympathize with your desire to bring the original unit together again, Delta, I also think you're edging into sheer arrogance with your opinion of us. "Mere humans" we may be, but even "ordinary" Coordinators could surprise you…_

Shaking off the grim thoughts –whatever Arkanian was up to at that moment wasn't her concern anyway- Talia turned toward Meyrin. "Have Heine, Rey, and Luna launch at once," she instructed. "I have a feeling we're not going to have to worry about the Orb units much longer, but that still leaves a substantial Earth Alliance group to deal with… probably including the stolen Second-Stage units."

"Right away, Ma'am," Meyrin acknowledged, and raised a hand to her headset. "Heine, Rey, Luna, you're to launch immediately. Expected opposition is Windams and the Second-Stage units, possibly supported by Orb Murasames."

"_Got it,"_ Heine replied, not quite as affable but fully as unflappable as usual. _"I'm heading out immediately."_ He paused. _"Any instructions regarding the _Archangel_-based forces?"_

"Ignore them, if you can," Talia interjected before Meyrin could ask. "I'm not sure I approve of their presence, but they _do_ have powerful units; engaging them is likely a mistake."

"Affirm," Arkanian stated, moving into microphone range. "Most coroners would rule engaging Nemesis with a GOUF as a particularly fast-acting method of suicide, Heine; and if you so much as fired a pistol at Strike Rouge, I suspect Hydra would obliterate you before you could blink."

"_Understood, Captain, Natalya,"_ Heine said at once. _"I just thought I should be clear on that. Heine Westenfluss, launching!"_

As the other two pilots swiftly followed Heine's GOUF into the air, Talia turned her attention back to the battle… just in time to hear, _"Kevin: go."_

* * *

(_You're with me, Griever,_) Kevin instructed at the speed of thought across the quantum link, as Nemesis' right hand reached for its left shoulder. (_We disable any Orb units that get into the air… and frying the weapons on those ships might be a good idea, too._

)

(_Understood, Reaper,_) Leona replied, with a strong impression of a savage smile across the Destroyer interlink. (_With pleasure._)

The entire exchange occurred in less than a second… and as it concluded, Nemesis' hand swept out a beam saber, and thumbed the blade of synthetic lightning to life. Its verniers came to life, and Nemesis raced down out of the sky like the Angel of Death Kevin proclaimed himself to be, dashing through the air toward the Orb fleet.

Simultaneously, the wings on Leona's Stormhawk –codenamed "Saber" to distinguish it from other models- split open, allowing the six blades of the Illumina to drop out. Their small lift engines activated, and the weapons circled around the Saber as it took off in Nemesis' wake.

"Wait for the Earth Alliance units to get close," Kira advised Cagalli, "and then help _Minerva_'s people fight them off, okay? The three of us should be plenty for taking care of the Orb forces." He paused.

"Assuming Kevin doesn't get too… overenthusiastic, anyway."

Cagalli chuckled. "He won't. He never disobeys _my_ orders, remember? Anyway, got it, Kira. You three handle the disabling, and I'll help Athrun's guys fight off the- Whoa!"

Her exclamation was involuntary… and prompted by a barrage of missiles that had suddenly flashed out from an Orb _Aegis_-class cruiser, clearly aimed directly at her Strike Rouge. Unfortunately for them, however, Cagalli was in no mood to play games.

Her reaction was a wordless snarl, punctuated by a burst of slugs from her CIWS, shredding the missiles far short of their target. "That bastard Yuna," she hissed. "If Kevin doesn't finish him first, I'm having him tried and shot the minute I get back to Orb!"

"Not a bad idea," Kira conceded, himself furious at the attack on his sister. "But that'll have to wait; for now, all we can do is minimize the damage." With those words, Freedom's verniers came to life, and he boosted off toward the Orb fleet.

As the four _Archangel_ suits finally began to take direct action, the freeze that had momentarily gripped the enemy forces ceased, and Murasames began to flash back into action, while Jet Striker-equipped Windams rose from the decks of Earth Alliance ships… accompanied by the Chaos, and supported from shipboard and underwater by Gaia and Abyss.

Ahead of Kira, Kevin and Leona were already nearing Task Force 15, with Nemesis making a beeline for the ship that had dared fire on Cagalli. Ineffective against phase-shift or not, the attack had infuriated him, and so the ship became his top priority in an instant.

A Murasame tried to intercept him along the way, but Kevin was in no mood at all to brook interference. Without even slowing down, his saber licked out, and lightning struck the Murasame's legs just above the knee. The azure energy blade bit deep, tore through armor, shorted out power systems, and melted through hydraulics with painful ease, and ripped out the back, leaving the severed limbs to tumble to the ocean below.

Even as the pilot cried out in shock and sudden fright, Nemesis continued on past… and raised its left hand, turning fractionally as it did so. The single buster rifle held in it –the other clipped to Nemesis' right wing- cracked twice, spitting a pair of extremely narrow-focus azure bolts into the Murasame's wings. The first caught its right wing at the connection to its fuselage, ripping the entire appendage off; the other hit midway down, ripping and melting all the way through. Most of the wing tumbled to the ocean, leaving only a sparking stump.

The entire mobile suit, out of the fight but intact enough for survival, tumbled out of the sky after its severed limbs, and Nemesis continued on.

The ship he was diving toward saw him coming, and raised its forward cannon toward Nemesis. _"Attention, Colonel Walker,"_ the ship's captain began, _"break off your attack, or we will-"_

Kevin snorted contemptuously. Nemesis' shoulder-mounted machine cannons flipped open, targeted both the forward cannon and the missile launchers that had fired on Cagalli, and spat a torrent of tungsten penetrators toward the ship. The anti-armor rounds, powerful enough to take out even some mobile suits, slammed into the lightly-armed weapons installations with punishing force, literally shredding them in a hail of bullets.

"Suggest you stay out of this battle from here on," Kevin suggested coldly, decelerating with punishing force and coming to hover directly in front of the ship. "You don't have any weapons that can hurt of any of us now; I just destroyed them. Just be glad those missiles couldn't hurt her, or I would've blown up your entire ship."

Considering that his attachment to Orb was tenuous compared to his devotion to Cagalli, he figured no one doubted the truth of his threat.

Spinning away from the suitably chastened ship, Nemesis rocketed away, heading for another Murasame. Stashing its other buster rifle, it soon filled its left hand with a saber, as well… and twin blades of synthetic lightning lashed out at the Orb suit's limbs.

Behind him, Kira shook his head. (_You should be leaving this to me, Kevin,_) he said silently. (_Nemesis isn't built for this kind of work; Freedom is. Leona's Illumina would work pretty well, too, but _your_ machine is made more for blowing things up._) As though attempting to prove his point, he raised his own weapons, spread his wings… and opened fire, targeting several Murasames at once.

"Showoff," Leona remarked dryly, watching Orb mobile suits drop like flies with arms, legs, wings, and heads gone. "But he's got a point, Reaper." Her circling Illumina blades suddenly halted in midair, then gathered together in front of Saber, swiftly assembling into the full sword. "Try this one for size!" Rushing forward, she swept the massive weapon in a powerful cleave, chopping into the bow of another _Aegis_-class. With the full thrust of Saber's verniers, the full strength of Saber's hydraulics, and the full weight of the sword itself behind it, the blade bit deep into the ship's forward cannon, tore down into through the decks beneath, and reached the ship's forward magazine.

Leona yanked the Illumina free, launching herself back into the sky… and as she did so, a good chunk of the _Aegis_' bow blew apart, vomiting flame, smoke, and shrapnel into the sky. The ship remained seaworthy enough to escape, but was most definitely out of the fighting.

"Now who's the showoff?" Kevin said sardonically, lashing out with both azure sabers. The twin blades of harnessed lightning caught a Murasame in the shoulders, melting quickly through the join in a spray of liquefying metal, then crossed inward, shearing through much of the mobile suit to either side of the cockpit, meeting mid-pelvis. As pieces of debris –and both mostly-intact arms- fell toward the sea, Kevin add, "Not that I'm complaining, under the circumstances. But still, that sounds a bit-"

A blue, white, and red blur shoulder-charged Nemesis from the left, sending the advanced mobile suit tumbling through the air.

"What the- Kevin, what happened?" Kira demanded, spinning around to check on his friend… and coming face to face with a sight that, in retrospect, wasn't so surprising at all.

"No more, Walker," Shinn Asuka hissed, from Impulse's cockpit. "You've murdered so many, interfered with us so many times… I'm not letting you shield them any longer, and you're not getting away with your crimes anymore! It ends right here, right now!"

Leona's fists clenched in Saber's cockpit. "Little punk," she hissed as a dark look started to form on her face unconsciously, "This time, _I'm_ going to pound you to a bloody pulp!"

"Neg," Kevin contradicted instantly, his thrusters flaring wildly to correct his tumble. "Continue dealing with the Orb suits; this insect is _my_ problem."

"You sure about that, Kevin?" Kira asked, concerned. "He's not as good as you, maybe, but he's still…"

"I can handle him, Kira," the super-soldier said confidently, staring at Impulse. "Go. I'll be fine."

"Oh, no, you won't, Walker," Shinn said savagely. "You've created enough chaos as it is; now I'm bringing you down!" Reaching to his shoulder, he snatched out a beam saber, and a blade of frozen fire blazed to life in his hand. "Your rampage ends here!"

Kevin shook his head. "You know, Asuka, for a mere Coordinator you're starting to become a real pain in the gluteus maximus. You've rapidly advancing from small irritant to major annoyance, if only from your shouting. So… let's dance!"

* * *

As ZGMF-X09A Justice neared the Earth Alliance forces, Jack Carter shook his head in mild disgust. "Whacko," he muttered, catching snatches of Shinn's angry comments over the radio. "How'd a loon like that even graduate from the Academy? ZAFT's standards sure have slacked since my day…"

True, Carter had entered ZAFT in a… highly unconventional fashion, having been created as a clone of one of their super-soldiers, therefore never going through the ZAFT Academy; also true, he himself had led a successful mutiny, engaged in an attempt to assassinate the man he was cloned from, and various other indiscretions…

But he had _never_ acted out of such raw anger. He had taken control of the _Tesla_ out of a desire for revenge against those who had created him, yes, but the _manner_ in which he'd done so had been calm, collected… and charismatic, as evidenced by the number of _Tesla_'s crew who'd chosen to join him.

"For Shinn Asuka," Carter muttered, "'charisma' is a word in the dictionary just above 'charm' and just below 'chair'… Hello, what's this?" he interrupted himself. "Well, well… time to have a little fun, I think."

Directly ahead of him lay an entire squadron of Earth Alliance Windams, equipped with Jet Striker packs… and already firing on him.

Instantly, Carter reversed thrust, decelerating Justice brutally, then threw himself to the left just in time to avoid an emerald dart aimed for his cockpit. "Not too smart, fellas!" he called, then snatched out a beam saber. Having little interest in the machine's trademark attack –with Athrun Zala in the cockpit, at any rate- the clone super-soldier was quite content with the single weapon, and his smile was savage as he brought the fiery blade to life. "The name's Jack Carter, but I think before the day is over you'll be calling me _Mad_ Jack!" He dashed forward, batting aside another emerald dart with his shield…

The Windam he was charging at staggered in midair, a segmented whip wrapped around its waist. "What the?" the pilot exclaimed, glancing about for the source of the peculiar weapon. "Where did that- Ahh!"

The whip glowed, drew tight, and literally melted through the Windam's armor, leaving molten metal in its wake. Within moments, the weapon had gone clear through the Windam's waist, and it fell in two pieces… then blew apart in the air, raining flame and shrapnel on the blue waters below.

"Sorry to interrupt," an affable voice observed, "but I have to say, taking even the Justice solo against _that_ many Windams doesn't seem very smart to me."

Mildly startled, Carter turned to see an orange GOUF hovering by his side, only now retracting a heat whip into its right forearm. "You'd be Heine Westenfluss, right?" he guessed, taking notice of the bright pain scheme. "I don't think we've been introduced."

"No, we haven't," Heine agreed. "But I assume you're Jack Carter; the rumor mill was buzzing for a week after you turned up at Break The World."

"The Justice is a conspicuous mobile suit," Carter conceded, and paused briefly to interpose his shield into the path of a green dart, spattering it. "One of only three true nuclear-powered mobile suits left, I think; one of the others is wreaking havoc with the Orb forces right now, and I have no idea where Wraith is… Yeah, I guess this machine is noteworthy."

Heine snorted. "Anything left over from Jachin is noteworthy, Mr. Carter; I should know, I was there." He nodded at the Earth Forces mobile suits still advancing toward them. "Maybe we should exchange notes later… but for right now, maybe we should take care of _them."_

"Good idea," Carter agreed, noting distantly that the ZAFT pilot seemed impossible to dislike. "Meantime, I can't say I'd mind the company; after all, like Walker, my IQ isn't exactly low, so I'm not _quite_ stupid enough to think I can take all of them by myself."

"Glad to hear it. Let's go!"

Had Carter taken the time to think about it, he might've realized the event was significant in at least one respect: for the first time, the Justice was actually fighting _with_ the people who'd built it in the first place.

* * *

"What's going on out there?" Talia demanded, catching sight of Impulse slamming into Nemesis. "Meyrin, is he doing what I think he is?"

"I think so, Captain," Meyrin responded with a wince, checking Impulse's telemetry. "Impulse appears to be in conflict with Colonel Walker's machine." _Against direct orders,_ she didn't add… and didn't have to, as everyone on the Bridge knew perfectly well that all their machines had been ordered _not_ to engage the _Archangel_ suits except in self-defense.

"Idiot!" Arkanian exploded, striding to the bow of the Bridge. "I'm _trying_ to recruit the man, and I can't do that very well if he gets killed!" She spun to face Talia. "Just what the devil is Shinn's problem with Hydra, anyway?"

"_Colonel Walker killed his family, three years ago,"_ Rey responded over the radio, having overheard the remark. _"Or so Shinn says… and Walker not only refused to deny it, he openly acknowledged that the fatal shot had to have come from him."_

"Solkin syn," the Destroyer archetype muttered. "Of all the… and the most ironic thing about the whole mess is that if they weren't trying to kill each other, those two would probably be friends. Certainly they both spend too much of their time trying to achieve revenge instead of our _actual_ objective!"

Talia winced. _Ex-mercenary cyborg in full rage,_ she thought to herself. _Definitely _not_ what I care to have on my Bridge in the middle of a battle._ Not that she intended to say so, of course. Leaving aside the fact that Arkanian was unlikely to actually _do_ anything, she also had the feeling the older woman wouldn't appreciate the description. _I've a feeling Walker isn't the only Destroyer to find the term "cyborg" insulting…_

"Vnyebrachnyi idiot," Arkanian muttered now. "All he's doing is making Kevin _less_ likely to come back into the fold, and the last thing we need is _him_ as an enemy…" Swearing vilely in her native language, she retreated to the rear of the Bridge, where she began pacing with impressive energy.

"Captain," Heim interjected hesitantly, "the Earth Alliance ships are entering range now. Justice and Heine's GOUF are keeping their mobile suits somewhat under control, but…"

Talia nodded sharply. "Right. Chen, bring up the Tristans, and prepare to fire. Meyrin, alert Rey and Luna to engage them, as well."

"Roger that, Captain," Chen acknowledged, typing quickly at his console.

"Yes, Ma'am," Meyrin concurred, and raised one hand to her headset.

_All right,_ Talia thought to herself, _now I _am_ starting to get tired of Walker turning up personally… if only because Shinn always seems to lose his composure the minute Nemesis turns up._

* * *

Watching as Impulse and Nemesis squared off, Athrun gritted his teeth angrily. "Shinn," he barked, "break off your attack immediately! Nemesis is _not _the enemy here!"

"No!" Shinn shot back at once, while snapping his fiery blade up in preparation for attack. "We've let him get away with interfering long enough! It was bad enough when he was just getting in the way, but now he's _trying_ to stop us from engaging the enemy!"

The blue-haired pilot drew a deep breath, seeking patience. _Every time I think he might be starting to learn from his mistakes…_ Admittedly, he was none too sure _he_ approved of _Archangel_'s actions –good intentions or not, they _were_ a possible distraction… and an unnecessary one, at that- but even he acknowledged the situation was at least their business.

"Shinn," he said, as calmly as he could, "all you're going to accomplish in this attack is to get Impulse damaged. Do you honestly think you can defeat Nemesis as you are?"

"Don't overestimate Walker!" Shinn snapped. "He's still only human!"

"On the contrary, Asuka," Kevin said softly, before Athrun could respond, "I'm anything _but_ 'only' human. A point which you really ought to keep in mind, if you want to survive."

A chill went down Athrun's spine. "Kevin…"

"Don't worry, Athrun," his friend said reassuringly, "I've no intention of killing him… yet. But I'm afraid your ship's mechanics _are_ going to be a bit busy after this." The super-soldier shook his head, smiling faintly. "That is, unless he pulls a truly outstandingly stupid stunt, in which case I'll do what I have to."

"…Be careful, then," Athrun said quietly, and turned his gaze to Impulse. "And as for you, Shinn… this isn't over."

"It will be," Shinn retorted, and rushed forward without warning, lashing out with a blade of frozen fire.

Watching Nemesis' azure blade parry the strike, Athrun shook his head, and spun Savior away. _That idiot,_ he thought angrily, converting to mobile armor mode. _Not even Yzak would've pulled something like this, back in the Le Creuset team… He may've been hotheaded, but he wasn't _this_ bad!_

An emerald dart from above interrupted his thoughts quite neatly, and Athrun banked Savior away from the incoming fire from the former ZGMF-X24S Chaos. "So there it is," he whispered, and whipped his machine around in a hard one-eighty. "At least _this_ threat is nice and clear-cut!" Rocketing back the way he'd come, he touched off a burst from his twin plasma cannons, unleashing his anger toward Shinn on a worthy target.

Five hundred meters off, Shinn snarled wordlessly, and thrust at his enemy's cockpit, trying to impale Kevin himself. _I'm going to bring this to an end now,_ he thought savagely, even as Kevin's blade of synthetic lightning caught his near the tip, forcing it aside mere meters short of Nemesis' hatch. _His trail of murder and destruction… ends right now!_

The sight of Nemesis so arrogantly interceding in this battle as well, tearing through Orb mobile suits in a clear attempt to prevent the ZAFT forces from defending themselves, had touched off Shinn's anger. It called to mind images of his family's deaths… and photographs he remembered from news reports of the aftermaths of the Crimson Tiger's rampages, years earlier.

Called to mind Luna's descriptions of her sister's letters, talking about the young soldier she'd admired… the one who'd eventually turned on her, and killed most of the unit.

As far as Shinn Asuka was concerned, Kevin Walker was nothing but a murderer, one whom he was absolutely determined to stop before he could hurt others. The super-soldier's high-handed actions on this particular battlefield had merely been the catalyst.

"You insect," Kevin observed, cartwheeling to his left to avoid a vicious overhand chop from Impulse, letting it pass a meter from his left arm. "The rest of _Minerva_'s pilots are busy doing their jobs, aided by even Carter, but you… do you really think killing me will solve anything?"

Shinn lashed out with his shield arm, and had the satisfaction of forcing Nemesis' right arm away from defending its torso. _"You're_ asking that question?" he said, barking a short, humorless laugh. "This from the man known as 'Racher'?" He thrust forward then, aiming for the opening created by his shield bash.

"Maybe it seems a bit hypocritical," Kevin acknowledged, snapping up his other blade just in time, "but that's only if you don't look more closely at my actions." Their blades clashed for a moment, crimson and azure sparks melding and falling away. "The biggest difference between us is that I only avenge deliberate acts. Okay, what happened to you was a tragedy. I've been there myself, I know how much it hurts… but I did _not_ do it on purpose!"

His right hand flashed up again, arcing from lower right to upper left, in an attempt to cut most of Impulse's torso away from the Core Splendor. As it rose, though, Shinn reacted with startling speed, yanking his blade away from the clash, then hammering at the incoming blade with his shield, forcing it away in a spray of sparks.

The two mobile suits boosted away from each other then, and hovered again, glaring at each other in a reflection of their pilots' intentions. Then Shinn's own expression changed, as something about their clash clicked in his mind. "I get it now," he whispered, with a savage smile. "You're still trying to disable me, not destroy me… and you're not used to that, are you? That… _that_ will be your undoing, Walker!"

"Uh oh," Kevin remarked conversationally… and Impulse acted.

Applying full power to the massive verniers of its Force Silhouette backpack, Impulse charged forward in a seemingly suicidal move, streaking directly toward Nemesis' raised lightning blade. _This is it!_ Shinn thought, smile widening. _He'll have to move it, or he'll kill me… but I don't have that restriction!_

Watching Impulse's approach with the slow clarity of his drug- and cybernetically-boosted synapses, Kevin Walker realized he'd made a slight error. _I've underestimated him,_ he thought. _Not much, maybe, but still… I didn't realize he'd be smart enough to recognize that limitation…_

In the split second before the impact, Kevin's hand moved physically within Nemesis' cockpit, reaching for the one switch not bypassed by his neural link… one kept that way for safety reasons, and sheer terror on the pilot's part.

The darting hand flipped open a cover, and pressed the switch marked "ZERO System".

* * *

"What's the current situation?" Murrue Ramius asked, watching the streaks of light and maneuvering mobile suits through _Archangel_'s forward viewport.

"The battle is joined, Captain," Jackie Tonomura responded from CIC; unlike most of the rest of the crew, he hadn't yet been able to bring himself to address Murrue informally. "The Orb and Earth Alliance fleets are intermixed, and both are opening up on _Minerva_… or trying to, anyway."

"Right," Miriallia Haw agreed, tapping quickly at her console. "Orb fire seems to be somewhat confused; possibly due to Kevin's transmission. Also, Kira and Leona are confusing targeting, as well as, well… knocking down anything that gets near them."

Murrue's lips quirked in a small smile. "Good. Natarle? How are things on your end?"

On the main display, Natarle Badgiruel grimaced. _"At the moment? No problems… but that's mostly because we haven't _done_ anything, except launch Jack. Under the circumstances, I thought it best not to launch Asagi, Juri, or Mayura. They wouldn't do very well, fighting against Orb units. As for the ship herself…"_ She shrugged unhappily. _"Leaving aside the fact that we don't want to advertise our more impressive upgrades to ZAFT, we're also not in a very good position to act at the moment. _Minerva_ is directly in our line of fire."_

The senior captain pursed her lips in thought. She didn't dispute Natarle's reluctance to launch her trio of FOX pilots; as the younger woman had said, they likely wouldn't be able to muster their full skill, fighting against former comrades… and it just wouldn't be right to even ask them to.

_Not that it would matter much if I _did_ dispute the decision,_ Murrue mused. _That's Kevin's sphere of authority, not mine… But as for the line of fire issues…_ She thought for a moment longer, then nodded to herself.

"Natarle," she said aloud, _"Dominion_ has the same submersible capabilities as _Archangel,_ right?" When the younger captain nodded, a questioning look on her face, Murrue explained, "In that case, I suggest you submerge for now, and come around to enter the battle from another vector. Try a flanking maneuver."

Natarle thought about that for a moment, then nodded decisively. _"Good idea, Murrue. Meryl?"_

"_Already on it, Skipper,"_ Meryl Steiglitz answered from off-camera. _"One _Archangel_-class turned into submarine, coming up."_

Murrue couldn't help but smile at the byplay. _I still haven't quite gotten used to how _weird_ that crew is… but then, they've spent so much time around Kevin since the hijacking that it's probably inevitable…_

"Murrue," Mir called, disturbing the Captain's musings, "it looks like Impulse is currently engaging Nemesis."

"Again?" Murrue shook her head. "I knew this Asuka fellow was hotheaded, from Kevin's descriptions, but this… Well, I'll grant he's got guts, and tenacity." She frowned. "Is he having any success against Kevin? Normally, I'd take it for granted that Kevin could handle himself, but I still don't quite trust that reactor system he uses…"

Mir shrugged. "I don't know about any reactor problems, but-" She broke off abruptly, noticing a change in Nemesis' telemetry… specifically, the telemetry from the machine's neural linkages. "Murrue, Kevin's alpha patterns just changed."

The Captain twitched, realizing quickly what that had to mean. "He's activated ZERO?"

Behind her, at Communications, Lacus Clyne inhaled sharply. "I thought he didn't use that anymore! After everything that happened…"

"Confirmed," Mir said flatly. "ZERO System is now in operation."

At the copilot's position, Andrew Waltfeld nodded grimly to himself, understanding his friends' reactions. He knew as well as they did that Kevin rarely used the system, especially since the previous war ended. It had nearly driven him insane the first time he activated it, then almost fried his brain when it short-circuited in the Marshall Islands.

An accident during testing of the most recent iteration of the system, two months before the attack on Army One, had left caused Kevin to virtually abandon its use.

ZERO System: Zoning and Emotional Range Omitted. A seemingly harmless acronym for a system that fed tactical data directly into the pilot's mind, correlating it with data already known to the pilot, and then producing a surprisingly reliable prediction of the next few moments of battle. Potentially enough to make any pilot into an unstoppable force, Baron John Tyler Onishi's brainchild –later upgraded by his son- was also very much a two-edged sword… with the potential to drive even the most stable mind –which Kevin's was not, often enough- completely insane.

* * *

A bolt of coherent light scorched past, just missing his right wing, and Athrun cursed. _Now I remember why I hate fighting machines that can fly,_ he thought sourly, snap-rolling to let a burst of machine gun fire whip past beneath him. _They're way too maneuverable for comfort…_

Pulling up in a sharp Immelman, he snapped off a full barrage from his beam and plasma cannons, trying to finish off his opponent in one, clean burst of actinic fire.

Disinclined to lie down and die, Sting Oakley sneered, snapped up his shield, and caught the emerald streaks on its surface… then cursed as one of the plasma bolts melted a jagged furrow along his right arm, almost blowing away his rifle. "You'll pay for that," he hissed… and deployed his weapon pods, spiraling them out toward the Savior.

"Not good," Athrun said to himself, almost conversationally, and snapped Savior back into mobile suit mode in a hurry. "Not good at all," he amended, when the pair of remote weapons opened fire, spitting emerald fire and a barrage of missiles his way.

Kicking in his knee-mounted thrusters, he threw his machine backwards, raised his shield, and triggered his CIWS. The first green bolt spattered harmlessly against the anti-beam coated shield; two more burned through the air to his left as he engaged foot-mounted thrusters to toss himself to the right. At the same moment, he locked his fire onto the missiles, and precise bursts of 20mm slugs shredded them short of their target.

Savior's VPS rendered it immune to missiles so long as its power held out, but Athrun was not at all inclined to take chances, then or at any other time. He remembered Kira mentioning a tactic Andrew Waltfeld had tried on him in the African desert, and he didn't feel like experiencing it himself.

"Tricky bastard," Sting muttered, chasing after his prey. Limited as it was to mobile armor mode for this kind of work, Chaos wasn't anywhere near as nimble as he'd have liked… though it did have a couple of interesting tricks.

Using his mobile weapon pods to keep Savior dancing around the sky in a predictable area, he fed power into his thrusters, rushing toward the ZAFT machine as he quickly as he could… and activated the beam claws in Chaos' feet.

Athrun saw it coming, blinked –not having seen that particular weapon in use before- and threw Savior back, applying maximum thrust to by himself a few seconds… seconds which he used to stow his beam rifle, yank a saber free from its shoulder mount, and raise both the fiery blade and his shield to intercept the incoming claws. He was banking on one assumption about the Chaos' tactics, and whichever permutation of it was correct, it could be used to his advantage…

A moment later, the circling weapon pods ceased fire, and Chaos crashed into the raised saber and shield, its claws of raw energy sparking and straining against the defenses, and the raw force of the impact sending them both tumbling.

_Gotta get him off me,_ Athrun thought, gritting his teeth as he fought against the pressure brought to bear by Chaos' vernier-backed thrust. _If I can just… There!_ Thinking fast, he rammed Savior's right knee into Chaos' chest… and activated the thruster mounted in it once more.

The result force produced equal and opposite reactions on both sides, sending a surprised Sting flying backwards, somersaulting wildly, while Savior tumbled down toward the water, its own spin equally uncontrolled.

_Got it!_ Nodding sharply in satisfaction, Athrun converted Savior to mobile armor mode mid-fall, fired his thrusters and twitched his flight surfaces to bring himself back into controlled flight, and roared back into the sky at full thrust.

"You're not getting away that easy!" Sting snarled, angry at Savior's recovery and at the very use of the unorthodox tactic in the first place. "You're going down!" Making a snap decision to try something unorthodox himself, he converted Chaos back to mobile suit mode, abandoning the advantage of flight for a few, precious seconds… and used that time to line up on the ascending Savior with his Callidus multiphase energy cannon.

With a smirk, the Extended pilot took his time aiming, waiting as long as he determined he safely could before firing to get the best target lock he could. Within seconds, he'd need to return to mobile armor mode if he wanted to avoid a rough collision with the water, but until then…

"I have you now!" With a smile of triumph, Sting pulled the trigger, sending out a bolt of red-orange fire toward the receding mobile suit.

A fraction of a second after Rey Za Burrel and Lunamaria Hawke _also_ opened fire.

Another bolt of red-orange fire, accompanied by a streak of coherent emerald light, leapt from _Minerva_'s deck, a few hundred meters away, a bare instant before Chaos' cannon could go off. Rey's shot almost missed completely, merely melting off the very tip of Chaos' mobile armor "nose" in a puff of vaporized metal… but Luna's beam cannon shot struck Chaos' right foot, ripping off both physical claws in an ear-splitting shriek of tearing metal, then vaporizing them in the beam's intense heat.

The impact, while not catastrophic, was fully enough to throw off Chaos' aim by a tiny but crucial fraction, and the bolt that should've torn Savior apart from stern to stem merely melted a furrow along its vertical stabilizer, before harmlessly streaking off and dissipating in the distance.

Athrun, glancing back in surprise –both at the attack and the counterattack which had interrupted it- caught sight of the two grounded mobile suits, and smiled gratefully. "Thanks, you two," he called. "I owe you one."

"Don't mention it, Commander," Luna called back, with a more cheerful look than she'd bestowed on the blue-haired pilot in some time. "Couldn't let you have _all_ the fun, especially with everybody else already keeping the enemy busy."

"Besides," Rey added, sounding almost sardonic, "losing our mobile suit commander would be… inconvenient."

Athrun chuckled. "I guess you've got a point there." He pulled Savior around, turning to face the Chaos –and its outraged pilot- once again. "I think I can handle him from here; you two just make sure nothing gets close to the _Minerva,_ okay?"

"Roger that," Luna agreed affably. "We'll keep the ship safe." She tilted her head curiously. "You going to shoot him down?"

"I think we're a bit beyond trying to recapture them," he answered, eyes focused now on his opponent. "Don't you?"

* * *

"Clever, my son," the gray-haired man mused with a small smile. "Clever indeed… and potentially a genuine hindrance to my objectives…"

Baron John Tyler Onishi stood before a door, several levels beneath the Onishi Mansion in the installation his son had deemed "Avalon Base"… a _locked_ door in Avalon Base, one of several such he'd come across so far.

_Well,_ Onishi thought to himself, gazing at the skull and crossbones symbol on the door, _I may still have the edge in plotting, but it would appear Kevin is no stranger to contingency plans… and that he's even more thorough than I am, when he feels the need._

The young super-soldier seemed to be a wizard with both locks and explosives. His departure from Orb had clearly been a more hasty affair than he'd have preferred, as most of the base was still accessible through Onishi's access codes, but certain areas had been completely sealed off, their doors guarded by a heavily-encrypted algorithm that Onishi himself couldn't fathom… and some were guarded even more elaborately than that.

For example, it hadn't taken Onishi long to realize that his stash of VX nerve agent was wired with a plasma bomb set to detonate if someone so much as sneezed in its general area. Similarly, the nuclear stockpile was protected by an equally tamper-proof Pax-19 fuel-air explosive.

"But," Onishi whispered with another small smile, turning away from the sealed door, "I'm afraid _you've_ underestimated _me_ this time, Son. Underestimated me rather badly indeed…" Walking briskly further down the corridor, he soon came to a large hatch, one which Kevin himself had entered not too long before.

But this time, when it slid aside, it was a different machine that waited among the silent Rex units. Similar to the departed Nemesis, and yet different… and totally unknown to the rogue super-soldier who'd so carefully sealed the base's deadliest toys.

"That bastard Steiger nearly finished me, and our plan," Onishi murmured, striding toward the mobile suit, "but you saved me from that… Sturm Falke. We suffered such a terrible setback that day, but you bought me the time to recover from it, rebuild my power base and infrastructure… live to fight another day." His smile widened. "One day soon… you and I will finish the failure for good, and with him, our greatest threat."

_That is not… the only issue…_ a thought trailed through his mind. _Kevin is doomed, Invictus and Carter inconsequential, and Michael under control… but there remains…_

"Yes," Onishi acknowledged. "Grendel. I'm aware of the potential danger, though I don't believe the threat is currently a serious one. Besides, the sheer difficulty involved in _locating_ Grendel…" He shook his head. "We can concern ourselves with that after our primary objective is achieved."

_Toward that end… _Archangel_ is the greatest obstacle on the path you have chosen. They are the ones most likely to resist the actions necessary to make your dream a reality. And do not forget… Kevin is a force to be reckoned with all his own, regardless of Snake Eater. He may defeat it, and continue to threat the plan. Should he and Grendel meet… should they then join forces with Steiger…_

"Then I'll deal with him personally," the baron said, unperturbed. "His variant of the design is different from the original prototype, but then this frame isn't in the form it possessed six years ago, either. Don't forget that Kevin is young, and lacking in experience. An IQ of 195 won't do him much good when he doesn't possess all the facts, or the experiential knowledge to _use_ that brain capacity." He shrugged. "Perhaps he'll beat Snake Eater; given the files the Allster girl absconded with, I'll even grant that it's a genuine possibility, considering how advanced Carter's genetic research is. Nonetheless, I remain confident of my ability to bring him down… assuming Delta doesn't do so first."

_The archetype… yes, she is truly an impressive being,_ the other thought acknowledged. _Michael and Leviathan will also be a challenge for Kevin, particularly if the resurrected one succeeds in unleashing the unit's full potential… Though of course, the archetype could also become a problem, if she realized how her actions were being taken advantage of._

"Not likely to be an issue," Onishi asserted. "Not in time for it to matter, anyway." He closed his eyes. "After twenty long years… the endgame begins…"

_Yes…_

* * *

"This is ridiculous!" Kira said in frustration, unleashing a barrage of laser, plasma, and rail cannon fire against a cluster of Murasames and old M1 Astrays. "Don't they understand where this is leading them? Helping the Earth Forces won't do them any good at all!"

"Unfortunately," Leona said dryly, dashing in close to unleash a mighty cleave on a Murasame Freedom's blitz had missed, _"not_ helping the Earth Forces would get them even less than that at this point, mon ami. I suspect Yuna's reasoning is that backing off now would only get them shot in the back." Her Saber spun around behind the startled Murasame, and crashed down on its wings; the combination of an impossibly-keen edge and sheer mass tore them off at the joint, sending them to tumble toward the sea below… followed swiftly by the Murasame itself. "Regrettably, I suspect he also has a point."

"Then we'll just have to make sure the Earth Forces _can't_ retaliate," Kira said grimly, and tucked his rifle behind Freedom's back. Then, drawing a saber, he added, "We have to put a stop to this before anyone else gets killed!"

The Illumina fell away from Saber's hand, then came apart in the air, the thrusters in the individual blades keeping them aloft as Leona converted swiftly to mobile armor mode. As her machine's wings spread apart, the DRAGOON-like blades socketed back into their respective compartments, her twin buster rifle also split apart, the two halves attaching themselves to either side of the shield, which now became the machine's "nose".

"That would be preferable," Leona agreed, her transition now complete, "but possibly a little difficult. We can only hit so many targets at once, mon ami." Privately, she, like Kevin, thought Kira's ambitions somewhat naïve and overly idealistic at times… not that she would ever say so.

She heard Kira sigh. "I know… but we have to do what we can." Spinning Freedom to dodge an emerald dart from a Murasame in mobile armor mode, he fed power into his thrusters and dashed forward, Freedom's right hand sweeping down at the same time. His lunge carried him forward at the precise moment his fiery blade intersected with the Murasame's right wing, biting deep into the wing root. Three meters of molten metal later, the saber ripped back out, and the wing dropped free, leaving a sparking stump on the starboard fuselage of the Orb unit.

_Sometimes I really have to wonder if that's any easier on the pilots than simply being blasted to bits,_ Leona mused, soaring past the now-tumbling machine. _That's going to be one rough landing… but unless he breaks his neck, at least he'll survive it._

Shrugging, she banked Saber to starboard, whipping around in a sharp turn to align her buster rifles on a Windam. This time, the ex-NGSF soldier didn't bother with disabling attacks at all. She merely smiled, waited for the target reticule in her mental vision to center for a split second on the Windam, then triggered both rifles at once.

Pure azure light spat from the emitters, impacting on the Earth Alliance suit's torso. High energy plasma struck with the force of nearly a kiloton of dynamite, and sheer thermal bloom vaporized most of the Windam's chest, turning it into vapor and airborne droplets of liquid metal.

An instant later, Kira took advantage of the Windam's sudden departure from the mortal plane, firing a pair of red-orange plasma bolts through the space it had occupied a moment before. Far less powerful –and therefore better suited to the task- than buster-class plasma weapons, they struck an Astray Shrike in both rotors at once, mangling the blades in the instant before they vanished in a puff of vaporized metal, and virtually blasted the entire backpack off.

Then a trio of emerald beams from below flashed up between the Astray's legs, nearly frying it on the way by, and nearly smashed Freedom out of the sky.

Kira jerked back, while Leona hurtled into a zoom climb. "What was that?" he demanded of the battlefield at large, glancing about quickly… before his gaze settled on the deck of the _John Paul Jones,_ almost directly below them.

"It's the Gaia," Leona informed him unnecessarily, viewing the stolen prototype through Saber's sensors. "Looks like those guys have come out to play, too."

Kira's hands tightened on his controls. "They're the biggest threat out here, Leona," he told her. "If we can disable Gaia and the others, the rest shouldn't be too much of a problem."

"Affirm," she acknowledged. "How's this: you handle Gaia, while I keep everything else off your back? Athrun's got Chaos, ah, 'occupied' at the moment, and I can't see Abyss from here; I think this would be the best division of duties for the moment."

"Right," he agreed. "Let's do it!" Deploying his rail and plasma cannons, he took aim on the Gaia, and fired.

Down below, Stellar Loussier glared up at him, and she threw Gaia into a short, backward hop, allowing the barrage to slam harmlessly into the water. "I won't let you win," she whispered. "You'll be finished here!"

"Impressive," Leona mused, launching another pair of azure bolts into the arms of a Murasame. "Most machines wouldn't have been able to dodge that in time… Guess Gaia, at least, _does_ have some merit." As she spoke, her twin beams smashed into the Murasame's shoulders, tearing them off and leaving nothing but sparking stumps.

The pilot of the unlucky unit promptly decided discretion was the better part of valor. He could continue to fight, after a fashion, if he converted to mobile armor mode and used his dorsal beam cannon… but he had a feeling the pilot of the steel-gray suit would probably lose patience quickly, and resort to a more permanent solution.

The Murasame turned tail, transformed, and fled, leaving Leona with an amused smile on her face. "Good boy," she told the fleeing pilot. "Now, let's see about finding something else to shoot at…"

Transitioning back to mobile suit mode, she brought Saber to a smooth halt midair, her gaze sweeping around for her next target; below her, Kira raised his beam saber again, and dove toward Gaia…

* * *

Within Nemesis, time slowed to a veritable crawl, as Kevin Walker's already accelerated synapses merged with the ZERO system.

It was only out of dire necessity that he'd activated the system in the first place. After his initial encounter with it, the short-circuit in the Marshall Islands, and a disastrous test of the new version a year after the first war ended, Kevin had a profound distaste for, even fear of, the device… but right now he needed it.

The information that poured into his mind would've been too much for an ordinary human to comprehend; Kevin suspected one of the few non-augmented humans who _could_ use it was Kira Yamato, and he was by no means normal. But Kevin could make sense of the data… and so, over the course of a an otherwise tiny span of time, he did.

In an extremely limited fashion, at any rate. Governors had been placed on the ZERO system since that first test, and now Kevin only engaged limited aspects of its analysis capabilities, centering in this case on analysis of his enemy's mobile suit and tactics.

Within Kevin's mind, a structural analysis of the Impulse's frame appeared. _Constructed of standard armor materials,_ he thought, coldly analytical now. _Variable PSA; nothing unusual. Currently equipped for atmospheric flight, with two beam sabers and a beam rifle for offensive armament, 20mm CIWS and a shield for defense. Modular design… leading to structural integrity issues._ An image flashed through his mind of Nemesis impacting at high speed with Impulse, negatively affecting the latter suit's connections between modules.

The vision vanished almost instantly, though, as Kevin ruled out the notion. _No time… Hm. Flight unit is powerful, but lacks maneuverability compared to Freedom… or a fighter._

The ZERO system brought to Kevin's mind old memories… and he smiled.

In the instant before Impulse's saber could skewer him, Kevin fired thrusters in his wingtips and feet, spinning Nemesis around to the right. The fiery blade of frozen fire still slashed across the black machine's fuselage, but instead of an impaling stab it traced a groove on the Nemesis' outer armor, melting a shallow trench just to the left of the cockpit.

Blinking surprise, Shinn whirled Impulse to the left, following his enemy's movement. "How did you-?"

"Don't get your ego puffed up so much, Asuka," Kevin advised with a sardonic smile. "Did you really think you could beat _me?"_ He shook his head, and reached across to disengage the ZERO system again. Then several commands flickered through Nemesis' command net… and the machine twisted, folded, and straightened into mobile armor mode. "Let's dance!"

Not giving the ZAFT pilot a chance to respond, he kicked Nemesis' nose up, fed power into his thrusters, and screeched skyward, giving in to a brief bout of mocking laughter as he ascended. _I should've remembered before,_ he thought to himself, remembering times from long past, before his mother's death… before ABADDON. _I always did love conventional aircraft… and nothing with a flight unit like Impulse is going to outmaneuver a fighter, especially when the fighter in question is the secondary form of Nemesis…_

"Bastard," Shinn hissed, and took off after him, using his huge thrusters to achieve a rate of acceleration which, if nowhere near what Nemesis was capable of, was nonetheless impressive. "You're not getting away that easily!" Putting away his beam saber, he yanked out his rifle again, and spat emerald darts toward the rapidly-ascending mobile suit.

One of Nemesis' thruster nozzles angled down, while the other tilted upward, and the opposing forces threw it into a violent spin, timed so that each bolt from below scorched harmlessly past its wings. Reversing suddenly, the spin stopped with brutal suddenness… and Kevin cut his engines completely, allowing Nemesis to come to a stall mid-climb, as its momentum ran out.

It didn't take Shinn long to realize why the super-soldier had pulled the seemingly suicidal stunt. Even as Impulse continued ascending, Nemesis began to fall back… tumbling over in the process, nose pointed toward the sea nearly a kilometer below.

Which, just incidentally, left the nose-mounted buster rifles pointed directly at Impulse.

The instant he comprehended his enemy's intentions, Shinn threw Impulse to the left, then flipped over and began a dive of his own, angling away from the falling Nemesis, just ahead of a pair of azure bolts that nearly ripped his legs off.

"Well," Kevin observed, reigniting his thrusters and leveling off, "at least you've proven you can learn from at least some of your mistakes, Asuka. I honestly wasn't sure about that, given that you chose to attack me in the first place."

"And you call _me_ arrogant?" Shinn shot back, turning briefly to fire another green streak at Nemesis. _"You're_ the one who thinks he's invincible!"

The bolt of coherent light impacted on Nemesis' armored nose, and reflected off the anti-beam coated piece into the sky. "Kid," Kevin said with an unconcerned smile, "I fought against Rau Le Creuset at Jachin Due, and survived the experience. Only barely, maybe, but I made it… and he was a _far_ better pilot than you are. Moreover," he added, juking right to dodge another emerald streak, "he also had control of his temper, which is more than can be said of you."

Shinn didn't bother to reply to that… at least not verbally. He instead whirled around, using his full thrust to counter his momentum, then began to accelerate _toward_ Nemesis. He again tucked his beam rifle behind his back, and pulled out his saber.

_This time,_ the ZAFT pilot thought to himself, _I'll clip his wings. Without those, he's nothing…_

Kevin saw what he was doing, and nodded mentally. _I'll grant he can fight, when he puts his mind to it… Time to see how good he really is._ Adding power to his thrusters, he raced toward Impulse in turn, and prepared to make his own move…

* * *

"Is there ever an end to these people?" Carter wondered aloud, unleashing the full power of his flight unit's Fortis beam cannons on an unlucky Windam. The Earth Alliance machine was caught just above the waist, and subsequently torn apart by the raw energy release, falling toward the sea in a tangle of mangled junk.

"Eventually," Heine said with a grunt, latching onto another Windam's flight unit with his heat rod. "But the Earth Forces people _do_ tend to be pretty stubborn. I was at both Second Jachin and the nuclear attack that started this war; that's enough to tell me that when they set their minds to something, it takes a lot of work to get them to change their minds." With another grunt, he tugged on the heat rod, and the superheated weapon simply melted clear through the Windam's right wing, ripping it off.

"I guess you've got a point," the clone conceded, as the Windam fell helplessly toward the water. "My exec, Jonathan Sarnac, used to be with the Earth Forces, too. Good man, for all that… and _he_ doesn't give up at the drop of a hat, either." Lashing out with his beam saber, he caught a Windam in the head, and dragged the crimson blade down through the machine's torso, melting armor, circuitry, and everything else in its path until it exited the pelvis.

The mobile suit split in half, then blew apart in a shower of shrapnel… and in that moment, a streak of emerald light and a barrage of missiles flashed through the space it had previously occupied, forcing Carter to raise his shield and open up with his CIWS, spattering the green dart and shredding the missiles in a hail of gunfire.

Heine had to ward off a shot a moment later, catching it on his shield, before opening the compartment in the base of the shield and allowing the beam sword stored there to fall into his GOUF's hand. "So," he said conversationally, bringing the weapon to life, "you work with both Naturals and Coordinators, huh?"

"Yeah," Carter acknowledged, spraying fire from his four Volucris machine guns at a cluster of Windams. "Never had much use for genetic distinctions; and besides, back when I first assembled my band of misfits, I was more concerned with eighty-sixing Walker than anything like genetics. These days… well, Jonathon is part of the reason I'm still alive, frankly. He took the initiative in busting _D'Artangan_ out of our harbor, then picked up Justice before I could get fried."

Sideslipping to let a barrage of missiles go by, Heine rushed toward the offending Windam, and slashed viciously with his beam sword, a backhand slice that caught the machine in the right hip, rent and tore its way up through the torso and cockpit, and ripped free from the left shoulder. Even as the energy-edged blade came away, the hapless Windam blew apart in a volcanic explosion of wreckage and lubricants.

"I guess you've got a point about the genetic differences," he said thoughtfully, boosting to his right and bashing his shield into a Murasame that had found its way into the melee. "I mean, we're all human, when you come right down to it… even if some of us are more human than others," the ZAFT piloted added wryly, in a thinly-veiled reference to his companion. "Still… there's one thing I wonder about: what do _you_ think about _Archangel_'s intervention here?"

"I think it's a bloody nuisance," Carter said frankly, pausing to connect the hilt of his saber to the base of his second weapon, then bringing the resulting staff fully to life. _"Dominion_ and I are one thing; we're acting as part of your tactical planning, and I for one don't really have any qualms about fighting Orb. But the _Archangel?_ Bah. Maybe it's just my problem with Walker talking, but I think they should've just left the situation alone."

"Agreed," Heine said promptly, and snapped up his GOUF's right hand… where the four-barreled "Draupnir" beam gun was mounted. "Even leaving aside whether or not this is _Archangel_'s business –and the fact that they really are getting in the way- look what it's done with Shinn." He shook his head, even as he unleashed a quadruple barrage of emerald fire at an Earth Alliance _Danilov_-class destroyer. "Don't get me wrong, I think Athrun is probably right about Walker in general… but if he's going to be driving Shinn berserk every time he shows up, I'd be just as glad if he stayed home."

The quartet of beams struck dead-center on the _Danilov_'s forward beam cannon, ripping and melting through armor like it wasn't there, before blowing the entire installation apart from the inside. The resultant explosion sent a surge through the ship's power distribution system, eventually ending up in her main missile magazine… setting off the remaining missiles all at once in the process.

A fireball bloomed amidships, and the center of the _Danilov_ simply disintegrated, blasting both bow and stern into the air, where they, too, erupted into miniature fireballs.

"Nice shot," Carter remarked approvingly. "And yeah, I see your point. But then, like I said, I've got problems with Walker, so I'm not entirely… objective where he's concerned."

"You really want him dead, don't you?" Despite the phrasing, Heine's words weren't really a question; by this time, he'd seen –and heard- enough of Carter to know the clone's prejudices well enough.

Because of that knowledge, Carter's response actually surprised him. "I'm… not entirely sure," he admitted, bringing Justice to a halt for a moment as he searched for a new target. "I always hated him for being the original… for being _real._ I always thought that I was nothing more than a shadow, and that the only way I could gain substance was to kill the original and take his place. But now…" He sighed. "Now, I've spent some time around Invictus, and I've seen how he lives. He doesn't think of himself as a copy; he considers himself more like a… a twin brother, I guess. And… well, I have to say that having a mutual enemy, one where our cooperation may be our only chance at survival, does tend to affect a guy's perspective."

Heine nodded slowly. "I guess it would, at that," he murmured… and then cursed, as a beam slipped past his guard to tear a ragged furrow across his left wing, resulting in noticeable airflow issues. "But now, I think we should table the discussion until we're out of this mess."

"Probably prudent," Carter agreed, and spun Justice around to watch the GOUF's back. "For now, let's just try not to get killed."

* * *

Stellar watched Freedom descend toward her, and only as its speed registered did alarms begin to ring in the back of her mind. She knew nothing of Freedom's actions during the previous war –such knowledge wasn't necessary for her role, or so her handlers had believed- so it was only now that she even began to wonder about its capabilities.

Not for nothing, though, was she enhanced with treatments derived from those used on the trio of "biological CPUs" deployed in the first war… and not for nothing was she flying a mobile suit considerably more effective than any mass-produced machine.

Glaring up at Freedom, she leapt back another step, let her rifle fall to the _John Paul Jones_' deck, and snatched out one of her Vajra sabers. "No1" she shouted, raising the weapon just in time to catch the descending sword on its blade. "I won't let you!"

The resulting impact forced Gaia's arm almost to the deck, causing the entire machine to bend over… but Kira Yamato was impressed nonetheless. _When was the last time I fought someone who could do that?_ he wondered. _Or a machine? …I guess it would've been Le Creuset, and the biological CPUs. Since then, all I've fought are mass-produced models…_

Stellar chose that moment to boost away, using her main thrusters to forcefully pull back from the clash. Her saber slid out from beneath Freedom's, causing the latter to bite into the deck below as the opposing force vanished; the crimson energy blade melted a full two meters down before Freedom could yank it back out, and come to a smooth landing on the carrier's deck.

"_Get him off the ship, Stellar,"_ Neo instructed calmly, watching with surprising aplomb from _John Paul Jones_' Bridge as the battle occurred only meters away. _"We can't have _that_ sitting on our ship, understood?"_

"Yes, Sir," Stellar responded promptly, reacting with the instant obedience expected of an Extended on the battlefield. "Get away!" Deactivating her saber and letting it drop to the deck, she lifted her rifle again… and dropped Gaia to all fours, transitioning smoothly to mobile armor mode.

Gaia's wings dropped down to either side, lowering themselves to horizontal, and streaks of crimson light spread across their leading edges. Then, without further warning, Gaia leapt forward, unleashing a full barrage from its now side-mounted beam rifle and shoulder-mounted cannons.

Kira saw the trio of emerald streaks coming, and flipped Freedom to one side to let them scorch past… but he almost missed the second strike of the attack. _Those are wing-mounted beam blades,_ he thought, suddenly recognizing the threat as Gaia altered course to intercept him. _Just like the Foxhound. I've gotta-_

His beam saber licked out to parry, its fiery edge descending toward Gaia's rising wings…

An orange figure came hurtling down from Gaia's left, slamming into its side just as Kira slashed. The blade on Gaia's left wing melted into the GOUF's upper torso, ripping nearly to its head before tearing out just below the chin; the resultant gash sparked for an endless moment… and a display inside the machine's cockpit exploded, forcing a cry of pain from Heine as a shard of clear plastic dug into his right flank.

An instant later, the beam sword in the GOUF's right hand sliced down, backed by the machine's sheer, falling mass, and crashed into Gaia's rifle and mobile armor head, melting and shearing through, then catching both ankles in the stolen prototype's forelegs, introducing them to raw energy as well.

Then Kira's blade came down, and tore into the GOUF's right wing. It met resistance for merely a moment before overwhelming the battle steel, blazing through with nuclear-backed power.

Gaia's head, forepaws, and the barrel of its beam rifle fell away, slamming into the carrier's deck so hard they bounced, and sank into the water with splash; the GOUF's right wing followed them down… and both machines fell into an uncontrolled tumble toward the sea.

"No!" Stellar cried out, as Gaia fell. "This isn't-!" Her voice vanished in a burst of static, as the damage finally short-circuited her radio… and Gaia landed with a splash, before sinking beneath the waves, the GOUF following close behind.

The Justice swooped down in a flash, catching hold of the GOUF's shoulders, and pulled it back up before it follow Gaia down to Davy Jones' Locker. "Idiot," Carter informed the ZAFT pilot with a grunt. "You just had to play the hero, didn't you?" He shook his head. "Hey, Heine, you alive in there?"

"…Yeah," Heine answered painfully, clutching at the wound in his side. "…Nice catch, by the way."

"Don't mention it."

Kira stared at the pair, eyes wide as he realized what had nearly happened. _If my saber had gone down a second earlier,_ he thought, _it would've…_ He swallowed. "Look, uh, Heine," he called, "I didn't mean to.."

Heine snorted. "I know what you 'didn't mean', Freedom," he said wearily. "I know you didn't… but watch it next time." He raised his head to stare intently at his communications display. "Take this as a caution… about interfering where you aren't needed." He drew a shuddering breath. "Jack, mind giving me a lift back to _Minerva?"_

"No problem," the once-taciturn and unfriendly clone said at once. "Justice ain't exactly a taxi… but I'll make an exception this time." Carter lifted the GOUF higher into the air, and turned toward _Minerva…_ but before leaving, he glanced over his shoulder at Freedom. "You might want to keep this in mind, Yamato," he advised. "I'll admit that this is your business… but think with your own brains instead of Walker's, the next time you think of adding more variables to a battle like this."

Then Justice's head turned again, and the machine's main thrusters ignited, kicking it back toward _Minerva,_ its damaged burden held securely in both arms.

Kira flew off in the opposite direction within moments, as fire from _John Paul Jones_' anti-aircraft weaponry reminded him the area wasn't exactly safe. "That was a close one," he whispered to himself, juking right to let one last emerald dart scorch past. "Way too close…"

The sound of an additional set of thrusters alerted him to Leona's presence, as her Saber boosted over to join Freedom. "That looked a little rough," Leona remarked sardonically. "You still in one piece, mon ami? No parts missing or anything?"

"Not a scratch," he assured her. "At least… not on me. But that Heine guy…"

She shrugged. "He made a choice," she said philosophically, "and took a calculated risk. Paid off, too; at least he's not dead." Saber's right hand reached out to touch Freedom on the shoulder. "Cheer up, mon ami. He's the one who got in the way –and just incidentally saved you from a possible nasty situation, I'll grant- and you both got out alive anyway. A few days in the hospital, and he'll be just fine… and next time, maybe he'll be a little more careful."

Kira sighed. "Yeah… I guess you're right." He shook himself. "Anyway, we've still got a job to do, right?"

"Right," Leona concurred with a smile. "Now, shall we be about it?"

The two _Archangel_ machines increased speed, heading back toward the largest concentration of Orb forces… and neither noticed as, behind them, a submarine-like shape beneath the waves reached the sinking Gaia.

* * *

In the handful of seconds before the two mobile suits met, Nemesis transformed back into mobile suit mode, and by the time they reached one another, a blade of trapped, manmade lightning was there to intercept Impulse's fiery sword, crimson meeting azure in a spray of sparks.

"So," Kevin grunted, trying to force his blade closer to Impulse's fuselage, "what is it that drives you to these extremes, Shinn? Is it that you can't die, either?"

"No," Shinn replied through gritted teeth, responding to Nemesis' force with a hard push of his own, "I'm just not afraid of death!" With a grunt of effort, he poured all available power into his thrusters and arm actuators, and managed to push the black machine away.

Before Kevin could recover, the ZAFT pilot threw Impulse forward, raising his saber above his head, then bringing it down in a powerful cleave, trying to bisect Nemesis from head to pelvis. Its own blade snapped up, even as its thrusters flared to correct its tumble, and batted the crimson sword away. Then, finally flipping upright again, the covers on its shoulders opened, allowing the machine cannons to spit a burst of tungsten penetrators.

Shinn snapped up his shield, managing to intercept the initial barrage, and drove forward again, even as projectiles whined and ricocheted off the shield. _Now you're mine!_ he thought, driving forward with the saber in a lethal thrust. Nemesis energized a beam shield on its left arm, trying to block the blow… but only succeeded in deflecting it. The fiery stiletto slid up the shield… and plunged over the top.

"Solkin syn!" Kevin spat, as the energy blade drove into his left machine cannon, melting through the multi-barreled weapon life a hot knife through butter. "Okay, so you're good enough to hit me," he acknowledged, forcing down his instinctive anger. "But don't think you've won, Asuka. You're nothing more than an insect, without the wit to understand your own limitations!"

"Oh, really?" Shinn snorted, flipping Impulse in a backward somersault to evade a vicious slash from Nemesis. "What are you going to do, kill me? I told you, I'm not afraid of death!" Pulling back his blade, eyes blazing with determined fire, he fed all discretionary power into his thrusters, angled straight toward Nemesis, and charged…

…Only to find his final lunge meeting nothing but air. _What the-? Where'd he go? _Shinn glanced about hurriedly, searching for his opponent.

"And I told _you,"_ Kevin said coldly, "that your skills do not impress me."

Hovering behind Shinn, Nemesis lashed out, azure blade gripped in both hands, and struck at the Impulse, biting into its left shoulder. The lightning-like blade, its construction more advanced than Impulse's Vajra sabers and backed by the immense power of a matter-antimatter reaction, met almost no resistance as it cleaved downward, sparking briefly as it came into contact with the machine's VPS but otherwise ignoring it. It melted down, turning armor to vapor and circuitry to even less than that, before emerging from the bottom of the joint, and pulling away.

To Shinn's shock, his machine's left arm simply fell away, taking his shield with it, and leaving nothing but a sparking stump behind. _He… he just… How did he _do_ that?_ He'd fought Nemesis before, but even then he'd not been damaged in such a fashion… nor had it occurred to him that he _could_ be.

Then shock turned to anger, and he let his saber fall from his remaining hand, then yanked out his rifle, spun around with a wordless snarl-

And found himself looking down the softly-glowing double-barrel of Nemesis' twin buster rifle.

"I respect your tenacity, Shinn," Kevin said softly, addressing the younger pilot by his first name for the first time, "and I'll even admit you have less reason to fear death than I do, in some ways. In the end, you will have fewer crimes to be judged for than I, and in that you _are_ the better man. But that very lack of fear, coupled with your temper, leaves you very vulnerable. You fought well here, but had I chosen, I could've obliterated you within seconds of your first ramming attack… or at any other time in the battle."

Shinn glared at him, fury warring with a faint, sick feeling in his gut as he realized the truth of his enemy's words. "You…"

"You made two mistakes in particular," Kevin went on, eyes jade ice. "Engaging me in the first place without even coming up with a plan, and then continuing to attack after I severed your arm. If you were going to attack in the first place, most of your moves were sensible enough, even smart… but once you took that blow, the truly smart decision would've been to back off." He shook his head. "If you're going to continue as a soldier, Shinn, you need to understand something: not all battles can be won. There are times when discretion is the better part of valor. Live, grow stronger… fight another day."

The younger pilot's hands clenched on his controls, and his expression was truly ugly as he took in Kevin's last words. _That _bastard_ is giving me advice?_ Shinn thought angrily. "Walker," he said in a low, dangerous voice, "if you weren't carrying that rifle, I'd kill you right now."

"I know," the super-soldier acknowledged. "You've got good reflexes, Shinn, I'll grant you that; not many pilots would've even managed to take out my machine cannon that way… or, for that matter, lasted that long against me in melee combat. I may be a gunfighter now, but I made my name with blades, a long time ago." He fed power into the thrusters mounted in Nemesis' feet, and began to lift away from Impulse. "Remember what I said, Shinn… if you don't want to end up as another space-dust coffin. _Minerva,"_ he added, switching frequencies, "this is Colonel Walker. Apologies for the damage inflicted on Impulse; _Dominion_'s people should be able to retrieve the arm after the battle is over, though. For now, I suggest you send out some replacement parts… and remind Mr. Asuka that doing that again _will_ get him shot."

"_Understood, Colonel,"_ Talia replied, her face and voice carefully neutral. _"Deploying a new Chest Flyer now. Shinn,"_ she went on, addressing her own pilot sternly, _"pull back for now… and do _not_ engage Nemesis again."_

"…Understood, Captain," Shinn responded quietly, and, with one last glare at Nemesis, he spun around and headed away.

_Hm,_ Kevin thought to himself, watching him go. _I somehow get the impression that Talia wasn't very happy with _me,_ either._ He shrugged inwardly. _Ah, well, can't have everything._

Glancing around then, he noted with some surprise that _Dominion_ was no longer visible anywhere in the battle area. "Wha…?"

"Natarle had the ship submerge, Kevin," Cagalli informed him, her Strike Rouge streaking across the sky to join him. "Something about a flanking maneuver, I think; but shiphandling isn't exactly my area." She looked at her boyfriend's machine curiously. "You know… it's kind of weird, you giving Shinn advice like that. It almost sounded like… you've got a soft spot for him or something."

Kevin snorted immediately. "A soft spot… for Shinn Asuka? Hardly. I just don't want that idiot trying again to kill me; he came all too close for comfort a couple times, before I really got serious. And besides…"

She tilted her head, puzzled by the way his voice trailed off. "Because…?" she prompted.

He sighed. "He reminds me a little too much of me, Cagalli, from around five years ago. I was never quite that hot-tempered, but other than that… It's too similar to my time on the run. I just…" Kevin shook his head. "Bozhe moi, Cagalli, I just don't want to see another Crimson Tiger. One was enough; the world doesn't need another one taking his place, and that's just the path Asuka is heading down. Matter of fact, I think that's just about _exactly_ what he'd become, if _Minerva_ were destroyed. He's already following the pattern too closely, with his family's deaths… and the way he feels about Orb reminds me a little too much of how I always felt about ZAFT, after ABADDON."

Cagalli winced, at the reminder of Orb. Involuntarily, her gaze turned to the Orb fleet, where Leona could be seen swooping around among the Astrays and Murasames, using her massive sword and careful shots from her twin buster rifle to disable them… while occasionally using more powerful shots to obliterate stray Earth Forces machines, or disable warships' weapons.

_How did things come to this?_ she wondered sadly, her eyes finding _Takemikazuchi_ amidst the now-mixed Orb and Earth Forces fleets. _Those stupid _bastards…_ How could even the Seirans bring themselves to do this? And how could I…_ She closed her eyes, wincing at the recollection. _How could I have _let_ them do this?_

Sensing her near-despair, Kevin quickly spoke up. "It's _not_ your fault, tovarisch," he said soothingly, voice soft. "You know, and I know, that this would've happened whether you'd given in to the Seirans or not. The way those two were manipulating public opinion, the treaty would've gotten signed one way or another, even if they had to bring things to the point of calling for your resignation as Chief Representative."

Cagalli sighed. "Yeah, I know… but it doesn't really help much, Kev. It happened on my watch, when I should've been in a position to prevent it… and if I'd been a bit more experienced at dealing with public opinion myself, I _would've_ stopped it in its tracks. But instead, they pushed me into signing that treaty, and now Orb soldiers are getting killed for a cause they don't believe in…"

Kevin didn't respond immediately. Truth was, he wasn't really sure _how_ to respond; her dilemma involved responsibilities he'd never had to deal with, and a type of situation he'd never found himself in. He'd dealt with politics a little since his return to Orb, following the first war, but not much. Most of his life's experience had dealt with wars and battles, where the chain of command was clear-cut, public opinion was effectively meaningless, and his subordinates –when he had them- simply did their jobs without arguing… and if they did object, he could put them in their place as harshly as necessary.

_Yeah,_ he thought, _I'm used to dealing with problems where the solution is to simply shoot at them until they go away; on the battlefield, that's usually what counts, and I've spent most of the last six years in one conflict or another. It doesn't help that I've hated the "high life" since I was six years old, either…_

"Tell you what," Kevin said at last, smiling rakishly at his girlfriend, "when I get Foxhound back, how about you and me bust back into Orb, find the Seirans, and chuck them off the top of that orbit elevator I was funding? I'm sure you'll feel a lot better with them out of the way."

Cagalli managed a weak chuckle at that. "I'd love to, Kevin… but tossing fellow government officials off ten-kilometer-high construction sites is usually frowned on, by the world at large and by the public."

He snorted. "So? Tovarisch, they've both committed about half a dozen different kinds of treason; I don't think 'the public' will object much if you let me get a little… creative with their sentences."

She smiled slowly. "You know… you might be right about that," she allowed. "It's just too bad we can't do it right here and now, though…"

"Well… if you let me vape the entire Earth Alliance fleet here, I could probably pull it off," Kevin said slyly. "Remove them from the equation, then land on _Takemikazuchi,_ force my way to the Bridge, and knock out Yuna, then take command, return to Orb under a cover story, force my way into the Parliament Building…"

Cagalli laughed outright at the suggestion. "Oh, come on, Kevin! I'd like nothing better, but you _know_ why the rest of us don't let you go firing that thing indiscriminately. One of these days, you'll accidentally blow up the planet, or get the entire world to declare war on us, or somehow trigger the heat death of the universe, and then where will we be?"

"Oh, very well…"

* * *

"Impulse and Heine's GOUF have returned, Captain," Meyrin reported, listening intently to her headset. "Also, Carter is requesting permission to remain aboard until after the battle. He… says he doesn't think Justice will be required any longer, and he wants to make sure Heine is treated properly."

Talia raised an eyebrow. _Now there's an unlikely friendship,_ she thought, bemused. _The fratricidal clone and the most affable ZAFT pilot I've ever met… but then I suppose it isn't as strange as the way Heine gets along with Delta…_

She shook off her musings, and returned her attention to the matter at hand. "Give him permission, then," she instructed. "And while you're at it… how badly damaged are Impulse and the GOUF?"

Meyrin murmured briefly into her headset, passing on the orders and making inquiries, then glanced over at her captain. "Heine's GOUF has lost a wing," she said, "and taken a deep gash to the upper torso; Kyle is already looking it over, and says it'll take some time to repair, from shipboard resources. Impulse has already received a new Chest Flyer, however, and is heading back out. According to the mechanics, the only damage to the unit Shinn brought back is the missing arm, which should be repairable easily enough if the arm can be retrieved."

Talia nodded. "All right. Thank you, Meyrin." She turned to Heim. "Bart, status?"

"Earth Forces fleet still coming toward us," Heim answered, peering intently at his displays. "They're starting to break past the Orb line, in fact; the Orb ships themselves are also proceeding, but at a much lower rate, possibly due to interference from Freedom and the Stormhawk variant."

"That'll be Leona Colde," Delta murmured to Talia, nodding at the tiny, nimble shape darting around at the other end of the battle area. "I recognize those colors, from her NGSF days; it figures she'd be one of Kevin Ivanovich's new recruits."

Talia nodded silently, more concerned with the situation at hand. So far, _Minerva_ had gotten off lightly; the sheer chaos had prevented most enemy units from even trying to attack her, and those that had tried had either been knocked out of the sky by Freedom, or blown apart by Luna and Rey. Similarly, _Archangel_ had remained safe… so far.

_Though what they're doing here in the first place…_ She shook her head. _I'm not sure who I'm more annoyed with: Shinn or Colonel Walker. Or, no, I suppose I'm more annoyed with Shinn, since he violated direct orders to launch that attack, with nothing at all to show for it… but the Colonel ought to have known something like this would happen, as well. Considering how Shinn always reacts when Nemesis is around…_

She sighed. "Thank you, Bart," Talia said aloud, carefully keeping her grim musings from her voice. "Chen, as soon as the Earth Forces ships enter attack range, open fire with the Tristans; destroy anything that gets too close."

"Understood, Ma'am," Chen acknowledged.

"Not going to try another Tannhauser shot?" Arkanian said with a small smile.

"Hardly," Talia responded dryly. "With Nemesis out there, I've a feeling he'd just stop it again." She sighed. "I wish those people hadn't chosen to intervene here. I realize that this _is_ Colonel Walker's business –since he _did_ assign his ship to help us, and those _are_ Orb ships out there- but it's doing more harm than good, frankly. Shinn's encounter with Nemesis, Heine's ill-advised attack on the Gaia…"

"In fairness to Heine," Arkanian pointed out quietly, "it's hard to blame him for attacking that way. Seeing Freedom intervening in a battle we could've handled ourselves… it's easy to understand why he'd be irritated." She tilted her head. "I have to wonder, though: how will this set back _Minerva_'s advancement?"

"Hard to say," Talia admitted. "But I can tell you this much: we're going to have to return to port after this. The damage to Heine's GOUF, and the Impulse's chest section, not to mention Heine's injury… We could handle any one or two of those ourselves, but all three?" She shook her head. "No, we'll need to pull back for now, at least until Heine's recovered enough to be returned to flight status. I'm not going to risk my crew by putting them into harm's way without full mobile suit support."

The older woman nodded slowly. "Yes, I can see that…"

Delta said no more on the subject, and fell into musing of her own. _Kevin Ivanovich… you're getting reckless, tovarisch. I told you, you should either join us, or stay out of it entirely; we don't need a loose cannon like you on the loose, especially with your habit of constructing noisy toys. You're creating obstacles in our path to a better world without even realizing what you're interfering with… so sooner or later, I am going to have to put it a stop to it… even if it means resorting to DEALT…_

"Captain," Heim called, unknowingly interrupting the ABADDON commander's grim musings, "we're entering attack range now."

* * *

_What a mess,_ Athrun thought in disgust, raising his shield to spatter an emerald dart from Chaos' rifle. _Heine's out of the fight entirely, Shinn took damage fighting Nemesis… this is insane. All this chaos, from a battle we could've handled ourselves…_

Not for the first time, he reflected that Kevin Walker's headstrong tendencies could occasionally be a real pain.

Although, he granted, rushing toward the Chaos with a saber in hand, not as much of a pain as the Earth Forces tended to be. _But then, I'm not sure _anything_ is as much of a pain as these guys… except maybe Shinn, on a bad day._

Sting lashed out with his remaining beam claw, smashing hard into Savior's shield the instant it got close, and Athrun's strike went wide, barely grazing the edge of Chaos' upper fuselage before simply cleaving through empty air. "Bad move," the Extended remarked with a smirk… one tainted by anger, for the earlier damage to his machine still infuriated him. "Now take this!"

Chaos' weapon pods deployed again, forcing Athrun to break off his attack entirely, shifting to mobile armor mode and diving away before the furious assault of a rapid-fire stream of coherent emerald light. _Blast it, I forgot how hard it is to get through remote weapons,_ he thought irritably, banking right and pulling a hard turn to starboard. _It reduces his endurance, but greatly increases his combat effectiveness while it lasts…_

A missile barrage from the other weapon pod streaked in, coming at Savior from six o'clock, and Athrun cursed under his breath. "Not this time," he whispered, and fired his knee-mounted thrusters in conjunction with a sharp climb to flip himself over. Now facing the flight of eight missiles, he cut his verniers entirely, beginning a backward freefall… and in that moment, Athrun triggered his beam and plasma cannons simultaneously.

Sting cursed venomously as his missiles vanished in a collective puff of superheated metal, but he didn't allow his anger to completely take him over. "This battle isn't over yet," he whispered. "You're not getting away _that_ easy, Coordinator…" His scowl faded, replaced by a thin smile. "Auel, if you're finished getting Stellar back to the ship, now would be a good time!"

His fellow pilot made no reply… but from his vantage point, Sting could see a shadow rising toward the surface of the water below.

A dozen meters below Chaos, Athrun re-ignited his thrusters, spun himself back around, and kicked Savior into a climb. Chased by staccato bursts of green fire from both weapon pods, he ascended rapidly, and leveled off on a course directly toward his opponent. _I just need one good shot,_ he thought, eyes narrowing as he activated his targeting computer. _One good shot, and this will be over…_ _Now!_ At the precise moment his crosshairs flashed, he pulled the trigger-

At the precise instant he pulled the trigger, RGX-02 Abyss erupted out of the water in a mighty leap, colliding with the ZAFT machine.

"What the-?" The impact knocked Savior off-course, with the four bolts of raw energy flashing off in a completely different direction from what Athrun had intended… eventually terminating in _Minerva_'s bow, slamming into the Tannhauser housing.

Had Talia chosen to make another attempt at a Tannhauser shot, and charged the cannon's positron bank, the resulting explosion would've blown off half of _Minerva_'s bow… at best. Even so, the raw energy release of two powerful laser blasts and a pair of high-energy plasma bolts was sufficient to break through to the cannon itself… and in so doing, trigger a power surge that reached into the weapon's standby energy storage.

_Minerva_'s primary weapon ripped itself apart in a titanic flash of light, vomiting flame outward and blasting bulkheads to shreds inside. The very structures of the ship closest to the explosion suddenly became weapons themselves, as bulkheads were torn into splinters up to several meters in length, and sharp enough to cut a man in two… as several crew members found out the hard way.

As damage alarms blared loud enough to wake the dead in the wounded warship, _Minerva_ began descending for an emergency landing… and in Savior's cockpit, Athrun's face went white with shock and anger.

Behind suddenly cold eyes, an emerald seed burst.

Behind another set, a crimson seed did the very same thing.

Sting took a moment to pump a fist in satisfaction, releasing that hand from his controls for a bare instant. _"Yes!_ Great work, Auel!"

"Not so hard," Auel replied, with a smile of his own. "He didn't even see me coming… and now _Minerva_'s hurting at last. Let's finish him off, and then take out-"

One of Chaos' weapon pods exploded, obliterated as thoroughly as the rest of Auel's sentence.

Sting's reaction was an immediate, instinctive, "What the-?" As he unconsciously echoed his enemy's exclamation, he got his answer in the form of the Savior hurtling into his view, converting to mobile suit form before his eyes… and snapping off an immediate shot at Chaos' other weapon pod, shredding it into scraps of debris in an emerald flash.

Only then did the Extended begin to realize his full peril… and by then, it was too late.

Making a snap decision, he reverted Chaos to mobile suit mode, as well, and snatched out a beam saber… just as Savior spun to face him. Tossing aside his rifle, Athrun snarled wordlessly, drew a saber of his own, and rushed forward, the crimson blade igniting as he flew.

Chaos was already falling, but it seemed so slow to the ZAFT pilot. His latent Berserker abilities active, time itself seemed sluggish, as though he had all the time in the world to finish his opponent off, before engaging Abyss, as well; as he had done several times in the past, he made good use of that sensation, and so reached Chaos long before it could fall out of reach… or finish activating its own energy blade.

Sting cursed, desperately firing his shield-mounted machine guns in an attempt to at least throw off Savior's charge, but the red mobile suit was implacable in its approach; in under two seconds, it was on him, and the shield on its left arm lashed out furiously, smashing Chaos' right arm aside in the instant the stolen machine's beam rifle finally became active… and then its right arm flashed up in a vicious slash.

The blade of frozen fire crashed into the underside of Chaos' left shoulder, sizzled against the armor, and tore straight up through armor, power couplings, and hydraulics alike. Leaving behind a trail of vaporized metal and sparking circuits, the saber ripped free from the top of the shoulder… and Chaos' arm, much like the Impulse's before it, fell away toward the waiting ocean.

A moment later, Chaos itself followed, as a powerful kick to the chest from Savior catapulted it down, launching it into a headlong plunge into the Straight of Dardanelle itself. To the Extended, it mattered little; the impact had already blasted him into unconsciousness.

"Sting!" Auel called. "Are you alright? Hey, Sting! Answer me! _Sting!"_ Receiving no answer from his fellow pilot, he forgot Savior entirely, turning his gaze down to the water.

Athrun's attention also dropped, as he prepared to take Abyss out of the fight as well… but before he could even begin to dive toward the waterborne machine, something else had already arrived in a blur of blue and white.

"_Bastard!"_ Shinn Asuka snarled, his newly-reequipped Impulse rushing through the air only meters above the water. "You're not getting away with that!"

Auel, to his credit, reacted faster than Sting, and had slightly more time to work with in the first place. Leaping back out of the water, he spread both fins, powered up his full forward armament, and unleashed a powerful barrage of six emerald streaks from his fins and a bolt of red-orange fire from his chest-mounted cannon. "Try dodging this!"

Shinn obliged.

Feeding more power into his thrusters, Shinn boosted Impulse higher at the last moment, lowering his shield to spatter the two green beams that still reached high enough, and continued his charge. Like Athrun, he disdained his rifle for this attack; instead, he whipped out one of his sabers, kicked himself even higher into the air, flipped over… and boosted down at nearly two hundred kilometers per hour.

Auel barely had time to realize his mistake before the crimson tip of a beam saber plunged into Abyss' head, destroying his main cameras… and 78.3 metric tons of falling mobile suit slammed into Abyss' chest, slamming it into the water.

At the speeds involved, Abyss might as well have been falling into a concrete barrier. The impact left Abyss' VPS unfazed… but Auel himself was dazed by the force of the impact, conscious but no longer in any shape to continue combat.

Impulse ignored the now-sinking mobile suit, rising back into the air as though Abyss were no longer worthy of its attention.

* * *

In _Minerva_'s forward levitator section, directly beneath the Tannhauser's mount, alarms blared, smoke billowed, and fires blazed amid the screams and moans of injured crewmembers. Bodies lay strewn about, as well, several of them beheaded or otherwise fatally damaged, while debris trapped several survivors.

And in the middle of it all, standing in front of a splinter which, moments earlier, had been moving at over a hundred kilometers per hour on a straight-line trajectory for his neck, Alec King simply gazed down at his would-be killer with a look of mild disgust.

"That could've been a real pain," the ex-ABADDON soldier remarked to no one in particular. He was completely unimpressed by the jagged piece of metal… despite the fact that, were it not for his brief activation of his AKWES system, he would've joined the corpses on the deck.

_That's what I get for leaving the GOUF checkup to the others to check on a glitch in the forward levitators,_ Alec thought, feeling oddly detached. _That's the closest I've come to being killed in a long while…_

"_Engine room!"_ Talia Gladys' voice abruptly blared over the intercom. _"Any engineering staff, respond!"_

Shaking off his reverie, Alec turned away from the fallen splinter, and jogged quickly to the nearest intercom panel. "This is Alexander, Captain," he said, bringing the microphone to life. "Reporting from the forward levitator section."

Talia sighed in audible relief. _"Glad to hear from you, Kyle. What's your status down there? Malik just had to put us down before we could crash; what kind of damage are we dealing with?"_

"Bad," he said bluntly. "I haven't had time to check specifically, but I can already tell the Tannhauser to blew itself to pieces; I think the capacitor feeding the magnetic containment system overloaded." He glanced back toward the carnage, enhanced vision and implant sensors making a quick scan of the damage. "Forward levitators were hit by debris, and possibly damaged by the power surge; they failed completely just after landing. Not repairable from shipboard resources. And…" He closed his eyes in pain. "Captain, we've got heavy casualties down here. I can see at least a dozen dead from here, and there's plenty of wounded, too."

The captain's momentary silence was eloquent, and told Alec that she, too, felt the loss… as any captain would.

"_Very well, Kyle,"_ Talia said at last, voice calmer than she felt. _"Corpsmen will be on their way shortly. In the meantime, do what you can for the survivors… and do what you can about the damage."_ She paused; and when she resumed, her voice was much harder. _"The Earth Forces will be feeling some… pressure… in a few moments themselves."_

"Roger that, Captain," Alec replied… to both statements. "I'll do what I can."

Then, without waiting for any further reply, he turned and bounded back toward the most heavily damaged section. Without hesitation, he spun his augmentation back up to full power, and began heaving huge sections of debris out of the way. _To blazes with caution, and hiding my identity,_ the Basilisk thought grimly, gripping a half-ton piece and throwing it aside with a grunt. _These are my comrades, and I'm not going to sit idly by and watch them die!_

* * *

Neo Roanoke was curiously impassive as he watched the battle unfold from _John Paul Jones_' Bridge. He knew he ought to be tense, at the very least, after seeing all three of his Extended pilots knocked out of the fight, along with a number of Windams being totally annihilated… but instead, he felt oddly detached.

_Possibly,_ he thought, _because we at least managed to damage _Minerva,_ even if we didn't accomplish much else…_

The sight of the titanic explosion that erupted from _Minerva_'s bow had provided Neo with intense satisfaction; had Sting and Auel not been disabled immediately thereafter, he'd have been good about the battle even now, despite the clear failure to actually destroy the ZAFT forces.

_We did accomplish part of our mission, though,_ he told himself. _That ship will live to fight another day… but it won't be today. With that much damage, their advance will be halted for days, maybe weeks… giving us time to repair the Second-Stage units, and prepare for a counterattack._

At length, Neo turned to his detection officer. "What's the status of the enemy forces, Lieutenant?"

"_Archangel_ is still holding position at the edge of the battle area, Captain," Lieutenant Gordon Salter replied promptly, fingers moving rapidly across his console. "They haven't seemed interested in much offensive action themselves. Strike Rouge and Nemesis have withdrawn from the battle completely; Freedom and the Stormhawk variant are still engaging Orb mobile suits, but seem to be running out of targets…"

On the main screen, the two _Archangel_-based mobile suits could be seen engaging a pair of Murasames together. Freedom went left, while the Stormhawk variant went right… and then Freedom turned slightly, opening fire on the Murasame on the right, while one of Leona Colde's swords dropped away from the main blade, flashed through the sky toward the left, and buried itself in the left-hand Murasame's main thruster unit.

Freedom's target took hits to the roots of both wings, ripping them off in a spray of sparks and vaporized metal, and both Orb suits tumbled away.

Neo shook his head. "Those two are entirely too fond of unorthodox tactics," he murmured. "They could be a problem… What about _Minerva,_ and her mobile suits?"

"The orange unit was recovered by Justice after taking heavy damage from Gaia and Freedom," Salter answered, "and, from what I can tell, will be out of combat for some time. The two ZAKUs on _Minerva_'s deck seem to have retreated back into the ship, probably due to the loss of stable flight; both Second-Stage units have also landed… now that they seem to have nothing to fire on." He paused, examining his readouts carefully. _"Minerva_ sustained heavy damage in the friendly-fire accident. I can't tell exactly how much from here, but the positron cannon appears to have been completely destroyed, and their emergency landing indicates their forward levitators are offline, or at least badly damaged."

Neo nodded thoughtfully. "So they at least accomplished that much, before being knocked down…" He frowned abruptly. "What about _Dominion?"_

Salter blinked, and tapped at his console for several moments. _"Dominion_ is… nowhere to be found, Sir," he said in confusion. "Sensor data indicates they began to sink several minutes into the battle, and after that-" He cut himself off, and paled. "Captain, reading massive energy spike in _Minerva_'s beam cannons-!"

The masked captain shot to his feet, all the pieces coming together in his mind, and slapped a fleet-wide link on his intercom panel. "All ships, this is the flag. Scatter immediately! Repeat, scatter-!"

Twin streams of emerald light erupted from each of _Minerva_'s Tristan beam cannons… and at the same moment, _Dominion_ emerged from the water _behind_ the Earth Forces fleet, her own Gottfrieds already charged.

The Earth Forces side of the battle erupted in a titanic flash of green light, as powerful beam cannons erupted from the front and rear. _Minerva_'s vengeful blasts were targeted on a pair of _Danilov_-class destroyers; each was hit square in the bow by a pair of 225cm emerald bolts of raw, destructive energy. Confronted with such power, they didn't explode, or break apart… they simply disintegrated, converted entirely to energy and wiped from the face of the universe.

_Dominion_'s own weapons were centered on a _Ticonderoga_-class heavy cruiser and a _Spengler_-class carrier. The _Ticonderoga_ was slightly more fortunate than _Minerva_'s targets; having been hit at an oblique angle, its bow glowed green and blew away like dust in the wind, but its stern remained more or less intact… though whether anyone on board had avoided being flash-fried by the thermal bloom was anyone's guess.

The _Spengler_ was not so fortunate. Hit directly amidships, she was massive enough to avoid instant vaporization, but the hammer blow of coherent light smashed twin holes through her hangar deck, smiting armor like it wasn't even there, and smashing bulkheads into lethal splinters… and then the thermal bloom touched off the magazines containing missiles meant for the ship's Windams.

The carrier erupted in a fireball, vomiting flame and debris across half the fleet.

Neo simply stared at the resulting carnage for several moments, taking in the utter havoc and destruction, and then closed his eyes. _We go from striking a major blow against the enemy to receiving even more damage in return in a matter of seconds… in part because of the interference of the _Archangel,_ the Freedom, and Walker's advanced weapons… I'll need to have a word with Lord Djibril about dealing with that element…_

In the meantime, he had other things to worry about. In the final analysis, this battle was probably a tactical draw, but strategic victory… but that would be true only if he cut his losses right now, and pulled out before anything else happened.

"All ships," Neo said, the calm of his voice incongruous against the backdrop of the still-flaming remains of the sunken _Spengler,_ "this is Captain Roanoke, on the _John Paul Jones._ We're withdrawing immediately. Retrieve Chaos and Abyss, then evacuate the battle area."

Closing the communications channel, he settled back into his chair with a sigh. "I did tell you, Yuna," he murmured, "that bringing Walker back into this was a bad move… and now you've compounded it, by failing to even get near _Minerva._ The only blow _we_ struck was sufficient to force a retreat, but not destroy it outright…"

Neo hoped that this experience would at least give Yuna more incentive to fight properly in the next engagement… but he didn't expect that hope to be fulfilled.

* * *

Murrue leaned back in her chair with a deep sigh. "It's over, then?" she asked softly, glancing back at CIC.

"Affirmative, Captain," Tonomura confirmed, gazing intently at his displays. "The Earth Forces are withdrawing, as is Task Force 15; it looks like the combined attack from _Minerva_ and _Dominion_ has forced them to pull back."

"Not without casualties, though," Andy noted, leaning back in his own chair. "Whatever that explosion was, it wasn't pretty; if there aren't dead ZAFT soldiers on that ship right now, I'll be very surprised. Not to mention what happened to that GOUF pilot, when he got between Kira and the Gaia."

"It could've been worse," Kevin pointed out, stepping onto the Bridge with Cagalli on his arm. "At least Heine survived, and the ship wasn't destroyed outright." He twitched his shoulders. "Frankly, I'm more concerned about the Orb fleet. We had to inflict some heavy damage on a couple of those ships, to keep them out of action; if this keeps up, Orb might have trouble just defending its own waters, after we break them free of the Earth Alliance."

Murrue nodded somberly. She knew quite well that Cagalli –and thus, by virtue of his absolute loyalty to her, Kevin- had every intention of retaking Orb at the earliest opportunity; more than likely, if Kevin was successful in retrieving Foxhound, the current government there would quickly find itself deposed… something Murrue would be happy to assist in.

The problem then, however, would be defending the nation from any invaders. ZAFT was unlikely to engage so long as Orb returned to neutrality –for all their mutual suspicions of Durandal, Murrue knew that even Kevin believed the man to be sincere in his statement that they wished only to defend the PLANTs, not conquer Earth- but the Earth Alliance was another matter entirely…

"Well," she mused, "I suppose that's what we're for, right? And Prometheus, of course."

"Of course," Cagalli agreed. "Prometheus does whatever Kevin tells them to, and Kevin does everything _I_ tell him to, so…" Her smile, of course, negated any suggestion that she was taking advantage of her boyfriend's unswerving loyalty. "I think we can deal."

The core group of the _Archangel_'s crew turned their attention to more immediate matters… and ships from four separate factions withdrew from what had been, minutes before, the site of a great battle. Not all survived… but all would remember.

And soon enough, they would all face the perils of combat once again.

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

With the rogue pilots of the _Archangel_ drawn into the situation, the battle continues, with ever-increasing chaos on all fronts. A stalemate is reached for a time… until a final eruption of violence brings the battle to a sudden end, with casualties on all sides and all participants pulling back to plan anew… fight another day…

Soon, unknown to them all, one private war will come to an explosive conclusion…

Yeah, I know, late again… and this time by quite a bit. Well, in my defense, this _was_ one of the longest chapters I've ever written… and that, I suppose, is about all I should say on the subject, lest I delay this update even more.

Before anybody tells me that the canon episode didn't happen at all like this, let me assure you that I already know that. I simply decided to essentially throw canon out the window here, keeping a few events but changing why they occurred, and simply adlibbing the rest. And yeah, I know the early parts of it were kind of lacking in tension, if only because I had several very powerful mobile suits involved. Well, I've got that in mind, and I'm currently pondering how to prevent that from happening again. Thus, don't be surprised if you see a few more additions, in the style of Cry of the Falcon (in other words, my more… creative side).

And now, without further ado, I present the chapter. Let me know if it was good, bad, or ugly… while in the meantime, I go into a coma for a week to recover from the sheer amount of energy I expended on this. –Solid Shark


	24. Chapter 24: ZERO

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

**Warning: this chapter may contain spoilers; those who have not seen the entirety of Destiny, proceed at your own risk**

* * *

_Not much like the old base, _Michael Carnehan thought, striding through the dark corridors of the facility set aside for Leviathan and its attached resources and personnel. _But then, I guess it can't be helped… not after that _bastard_ Hydra wrecked the original project._

As his angry steps echoed toward the hangar containing his purloined mobile suit, the resurrected Destroyer couldn't help but reflect on his most recent encounter with a Destroyer. Walking toward the silent, still behemoth, Carnehan reflected that, ordinarily, he'd have expected defeating Kevin Walker to be a simple matter indeed; after all, he had ZGMF-XZ15A/M Leviathan on his side. Kevin's own mobile suit, Kraken had proved quite satisfactorily in their last encounter that Nemesis was no match for Leviathan.

_Unfortunately,_ he thought grimly, leaping easily up to Leviathan's left knee,_Hydra and Nemesis aren't the only problems now. There's Yamato and Freedom, curse them all. Not to mention that Stormhawk variant…_

Though their encounter had proven Nemesis could be defeated, Mike had also discovered just how dangerous an opponent Kira Yamato truly was. In theory, a machine such as Freedom -a full generation behind the state-of-the-art Leviathan- should've been no match for the antimatter-powered mobile suit, but actual practice had proven the pilot really _did_ matter more than the machine.

"Combine that with 'Saber'," he muttered to himself, clambering up to the cockpit, "and I've got unanticipated problems."

All in all, it wasn't something Carnehan truly cared to contemplate. He knew ZAFT was coming up with new units of their own, machines which could prove to be a match for even the best available to _Archangel_, but they remained far from complete; until then, Leviathan would be Gilbert Durandal's greatest tool in his clandestine pursuits…

Which was, of course, one reason Mike had boarded Leviathan on this particular day. Since his encounter with the Hydra and his allies, he'd been running a number of training missions, honing his skill with the purloined mobile suit, as well as running many, many simulations based on battle data from both Freedom and Saber.

_On foot,_ he thought, laying his palm against the neural interface on his right armrest, _I could take any of them apart, even Hydra. But even with Leviathan, the triad of Nemesis, Freedom, and Saber are a very, very different matter…_

(_It appears you have a problem, O Kraken…_)

Carnehan froze, startled by the thought that was not his own. At first, his impression was that he had imagined it; then he wondered if he was, indeed, as insane as others often accused him of being. After all, there was simply no good reason to be hearing another's thoughts when hooked up to a mobile suit. Had another Destroyer been nearby, he could've written it off as someone contacting him through the old linkages, but here…

(_A problem,_) the other thought mused, seemingly oblivious to the Kraken's sudden unease, (_but not, perhaps, an insurmountable one. You are stronger than I had anticipated, Kraken; perhaps you are, indeed, worthy to wield Leviathan's full power…_)

_Who are you?_ Mike demanded, alarm growing with each passing moment. _Or should that be, _what _are you?_

(_Something Hydra did not guard as thoroughly as he should have,_) the voice told him. (_He believed a simple biometric lock, keyed to the zoanthrope gene you lack, would be sufficient to prevent others from utilizing Leviathan's full power… but he did not fully understand the principles with which he tampered. When he altered this system, he gave rise to something new… and something not fully under his control._)

_What do you mean?_ Kraken thought suspiciously. _What did my bastard of a brother do? Explain yourself!_

(_I am that which gives him his greatest advantage, Kraken; I am that which his ambitious father originally created… and I deem you worthy to wield this sword with its full strength. Alone, I can do nothing. Hydra's protections were sufficient to prevent my accessing anything other than Leviathan's sensors… but I can grant you strength, Kraken. Strength enough to face Nemesis' greatest weapon, perhaps even to face Freedom itself…_)

Mike gasped as the full connection opened, and he began to understand exactly what had made his wayward brother such an unstoppable force… and how badly the Hydra had miscalculated when he altered his father's original designs. _…Who are you, then?_

A silent laugh. (_I have no name; my existence has but one purpose: to aid in my master's battles. But… you may call me ZERO…_)

* * *

Mad Aves stood in the bow section of _Minerva,_ looking over the severe damage, and shook his head in disgust. "I tell ya, Kyle," he said over his shoulder, "if I hadn't seen this place with my own eyes just before the battle, I'd never have believed this used to be a Tannhauser."

Alec King, standing just behind his nominal superior, couldn't disagree with the older man's words. _Good thing we weren't trying to fire this thing when it blew,_ he reflected. _That might've blown the_ entire _bow off, not just the Tannhauser housing and forward levitators…_

His opinion was a very well-informed one, for the ex-Destroyer had been entirely too close to the levitators for comfort when they exploded; had he not been augmented, he was quite certain it would've killed him… much as it had killed a number of his crewmates.

After the tactical victory but strategic defeat at the Dardanelle Strait,_Minerva_ -aided and guarded by _Dominion-_ had carefully limped away from the battle area, retreating to the ZAFT-aligned port of Tarcuius, in the Sea of Marmara, for some much-needed repairs. In the wake of the disastrous engagement, much of _Minerva_'s bow was in ruins… and a number of her crew were dead, crushed or shredded by the explosions and debris thrown about by the freak hit.

_To think it was from one of our own machines,_ Alec thought, noting the grim irony of the event. _Well, much as the lot of us may be irritated with_ Archangel _showing up, only a truly dedicated anti-Orb zealot would accuse them of being for responsible for _this_ mess…_

_Of course, Shinn Asuka_ is _such an anti-Orb zealot, but he's only one man; Zala can almost certainly keep him in check… and if he can't, then Delta can._

Alec's musings were interrupted by a sigh from his companion. "Well, what do you think, Alec?" Aves asked. "This mess as bad as thought the first time we checked it?"

"I think so," Alec said regretfully. "Looks like we'll have to replace at least twenty meters of bulkhead, most of the deck separating the Tannhauser mount from the levitator maintenance section, and more wiring than I like to think about. Not to mention the cannon itself was blown to kingdom come, along with a lot of secondary systems…"

Another, heavier sigh came from the older man. "Yeah, that's what I thought. This sure isn't going to be an easy job… and it doesn't help that we're shorthanded." He shook his heads. "Good thing so much of the Eurasian Federation is friendly to us these days… and that we've got _Dominion_ with us. Maybe those Prometheus maniacs can give us a hand."

Alec grunted noncommittally at that; he wasn't that big a fan of Prometheus, but he did have to admit he was biased, considering his past with the man in overall command of the organization.

"Well, I'd better call it in to the captain." Turning away from the twisted wreckage that had once been two entire decks, Aves made his way to the nearest intercom and punched up a link to the Bridge. "Captain, this is Aves," he reported. "I've got the new damage assessment for you, Ma'am."

On the other end, he could almost see the grimace on Talia Gladys' face._"I'm probably going to regret this… but how bad is it, Aves?"_

"Bad," the mechanic said bluntly. "We've finally penetrated clear to the bow, and it's at least as bad as our original estimate suggested. The Tannhauser is just gone, and so is the standby power supply; the positron bank is in rough shape, too, though not quite as bad. And, of course, the forward levitators are pretty much a write-off."

_"Badly damaged?"_ Talia wondered aloud… though she sounded more like she was trying to be optimistic than actually believing it.

"More like scrapped entirely," Aves said heavily. "When Savior's shots came in, they blew up pretty much everything that _could_ blow up here; anything that wasn't destroyed by the explosions got shredded by shrapnel."

_That,_ Alec knew, was quite the understatement. Having nearly been beheaded by a two-meter-long metal splinter, he knew all too well that the ship's forward spaces had resembled an antechamber to hell in those few, terrible moments.

"Bottom line, Captain," Aves was saying now, "this is going to take us a while to fix. Probably not as long as our layover in Orb, especially if _Dominion_'s people help, but we're also going to need those supplies from Tarcuius."

It was Talia's turn to sigh. _"Understood, Aves. I'll get you whatever help you need; though we won't be going anywhere for at least a week anyway, considering Heine's injuries. More like two or three, really… In the meantime, do what you can."_

"Will do, Captain," Aves promised, and cut the link. "Well," he said, turning back to his waiting subordinates, "you heard her. Everybody get back to work; we've got a lot to do before this ship can go back on the offensive."

_Yeah,_ Alec thought, turning back to help move more debris,_ a lot of work… and maybe during that time, someone will convince my semi-esteemed former boss that turning up all the time is_ not _helping…_

* * *

Standing outside _Minerva,_ Talia Gladys gazed at her proud ship's bow with a feeling akin to sadness. _One shot, _she thought, depressed._ One freak hit knocks Athrun off course, and the resulting misfire nearly destroys our entire bow…_

That the subsequent battle had been a nearly overwhelming victory mattered little; she was sure the stolen Second-Stage machines would be back on the battlefield soon enough, and the massive destruction inflicted on the Earth Forces naval fleet mattered little in the face of_Minerva_'s forced retreat from the region.

"That damage is really going to set us back," Talia murmured, shaking her head. "Even with _Dominion_'s people to help, by the time we finish these repairs the Earth Forces will have had too much time to regroup, as well…"

"It_ was_ a setback, yes," Natalya Ivanova Arkanian agreed quietly, stepping up to the captain's side. "I don't believe I've ever seen a single attack do so much damage to a ship; nothing from a mobile suit, anyway. Well, perhaps Freedom with METEOR support, but nothing short of that. That something like the Savior could've done this…"

"I know." Talia sighed. "And our casualties didn't help, either. When the Tannhauser's systems blew…" Unbidden, her gaze moved to the process of stretchers coming out from _Minerva_'s main hatch… several of which held black body bags, instead of bandaged personnel.

Delta caught the direction of her stare. "Da," she murmured, "it was very bad… and almost worse. How many casualties did we have, anyway?"

"Thirty-three," the younger woman said bitterly. "Fifteen were fatal -mostly from when the Tannhauser exploded- and some of the injured are in critical condition… not to mention that one of them was one of our pilots, leaving us shorthanded in that department."

"Heine, yes." Arkanian nodded. "Not exactly his brightest move ever, getting between Freedom and Gaia; certainly not as smart as some of his actions during the nuclear attack that ushered in the new war." She tilted her head. "Just what prompted him to pull that stunt in the first place, anyway? From what I saw, Freedom had the situation under control anyway."

Talia shrugged. "Hard to say, since Heine's been somewhat reticent on the matter. My guess, though, is that he was as bothered as any of us by _Archangel_'s unilateral interference, and decided to show Freedom we didn't need help from interlopers, however well-intentioned."

The super-soldier snorted. "Not the best way he could've expressed his displeasure, I think," she opined, "but… Well, I can understand his feelings. I can't say I was entirely pleased with_Archangel_'s appearance myself."

"Do you suppose Walker had anything to do with it?" the captain wondered. "Considering his habit of turning up to help us out…"

"Possible, but unlikely." Delta shook her head. "I know Kevin. Had it been his idea, he would not have brought along Lady Cagalli, I suspect; her safety is his priority, above all other obligations. On the other hand, if she _did_ decide to intervene, then he would simply obey the order, without question."

Talia sighed. "His loyalty is admirable… but I have to say, it's inconvenient. He had to know what kind of an effect he'd have on Shinn; if he'd been a little less submissive, maybe he'd have convinced his friends that this was a bad idea…"

Arkanian somehow didn't think it would've happened that way under any circumstances, but she chose to hold her peace. _For one thing, I expect she knows better than that. Kevin is a very confident individual… and one with a low opinion of Shinn, both as a person and as a pilot. I highly doubt Kevin would be at all deterred by Shinn's potential reaction; few things impress him less than a soldier he deems to be of little threat…_

"I don't suppose you might be able to convince him to back off a little?"

Delta blinked, jolted out of her reverie. "I'm working on it, actually," she said after a moment. "Our last meeting did not, unfortunately, go quite as I planned, and he's disinclined to listen to anyone from ZAFT to begin with, but… I might be able to get through to him." She lifted her left hand then, and triggered a minor subroutine in her augmentation. After a moment, a "delta" symbol coalesced on the back of the hand, with a serpentine design entwined with the Greek letter. "I am, after all, ABADDON… and so, however much he may sometimes deny it, is he…"

* * *

Standing some distance away from the officers, Shinn Asuka cast a bitter gaze toward the procession of dead and wounded coming out of _Minerva._ The number of casualties from the battle had come as something of a shock to him, even after having seen the damage as it happened… and he, for one, knew exactly who to blame for the disaster.

_Those meddling bastards on the _Archangel, he thought bitterly. _If they hadn't turned up, made the situation so chaotic… How many people have to die because of Athha's foolishness and Walker's treachery?_

He clenched a fist in anger. _Everything always goes wrong when Walker shows up; and it's even worse when that bastard brings along his entire ship. All those deaths… and Heine's in bad shape, too, after that!_

Shinn did grant that one Walker, at least, wasn't so bad; Jack Carter had shown himself to be far more honorable, in Shinn's opinion, than the original, by virtue of his actions with -and in rescue of- Heine. Nonetheless, the incident mostly served to give him additional prove, in his eyes, of the recklessness and arrogance of the _Archangel_ and the so-called "Angel of Death".

A quiet sigh interrupted his thoughts, followed by a voice that Shinn really didn't care to hear just then. "Let me guess: you're thinking of how all this is Kevin Walker's fault, am I right?"

Shinn didn't bother to turn. "Isn't it? Well, maybe not _entirely_ his fault -the idiots on the _Archangel_ obviously agreed- but he sure did enough damage all by himself… and the _rest_ of them certainly added to the chaos." He gestured forcefully to the procession of body bags. "Look at them! Those people were all alive before _Archangel_turned up! All those injured were still healthy before that!"

"It looks to me," Athrun Zala said softly, "that your pride was one of the worst casualties, Shinn. Because as much as I question the wisdom of _Archangel_'s intervention, I know better than to blame them for everything." He nodded at the gaping, jagged hole in_Minerva_'s bow. "They had nothing at all to do with _that,_ Shinn; none of _Archangel_'s forces were anywhere near when Abyss threw off my aim. You want to blame someone for _Minerva_'s damage, blame the Earth Forces."

"Oh, they've got their fair share of the blame, all right," Shinn acknowledged quietly. "But I don't think it would've gone that far if _Archangel_ hadn't interfered. Without their confusion, I wouldn't have been distracted-"

"Enough," his commander said curtly, gaze hard as he stepped in front of Shinn, looking him directly in the eyes. "Don't even bother trying to blame Kevin for _that_ one, Shinn. I was watching you, and I saw what you did: you attacked him out of hand, ignoring your primary mission and acting against orders to try and take on Nemesis… which, I might add, you had effectively no chance of defeating just then, especially with your attitude."

The black-haired pilot snorted, his red eyes blazing. "Hydra isn't invincible, Commander," he said harshly. "I hurt him in that encounter, and if weren't for that rifle of his, I _would_ have brought him down."

Athrun didn't flinch. "At which point I would've shot you on the spot," he said flatly. "You're lucky you _didn't_ kill him, Shinn, because I won't tolerate that kind of gross insubordination any longer. Bad enough when you disobeyed direct orders in the Indian Ocean -not to mention telling your direct superior to shut up- but_killing_ someone you were ordered not to engage, especially someone not at all interested in attacking us… That would be _far_ over the line, Shinn."

Shinn locked eyes with his commander, refusing to back down. _I can't believe Chairman Durandal put _him _in charge of_ Minerva_'s mobile suit operations,_ he thought in disgust. _Someone so clearly tied to Orb, and so forgiving of a menace like Walker… If he think that threat is going to scare me, he's wrong._

"You wouldn't dare," he said softly. "Summary execution for killing someone like Walker? You'd never get away with it, even as a FAITH operative."

"I would've been within my rights to do it in the Indian Ocean, Shinn," Athrun retorted. "Some officers I know _would_ have done so, especially with your record. I'm warning you now, Shinn: if you keep crossing the line like this, it _will_ be the end of you, either from a court martial… or from Kevin's buster rifle." He turned away then, and started walking toward the ship. "Next time, don't expect me to intervene, either. I won't risk my own life if you choose to throw yours away in such a pointless act of insubordination."

Both of Shinn's fists clenched now, as Athrun walked away. _Bastard,_ he thought. _He wonders how I got this far; _I _wonder how_ he _got where he is, with that attitude._ He's _the one who's going to have problems if he continues… and so what if he doesn't intervene the next time I face Walker?_

After all, he'd proven that he could hurt the Nemesis. Next time… he'd bring it all to an end at last.

* * *

Athrun stepped onto _Minerva_'s Bridge, paused, and took a deep, calming breath. His argument with Shinn had not been kind to his temper; the increasing arrogance and recklessness of the younger pilot was beginning to grate on him, and Shinn's obsession with defeating the Nemesis was only making it worse.

_Which is why it would really help if I could convince him not to bring Nemesis anywhere near,_ he thought, walking toward the captain's chair. _I understand what he means about having a debt to the Hawke family, but this is only making things worse…_

Stepping to Talia's side, Athrun cleared his throat. "Do you have a moment, Captain?"

She glanced up. "Of course, Athrun. I was actually intending to speak with you soon anyway." Talia tilted her head. "Would I be correct in thinking this has to do with the _Archangel_'s recent actions?"

He nodded. "That's right."

Talia leaned back in her chair with a sigh. "Those people… I wish I knew what they were up to. I know what they did during the last war, but this… They made what would otherwise have been a reasonably simple battle into a very chaotic one."

"…I don't understand what they were doing, either," Athrun admitted quietly. "I know those people well, Captain; it's not like them to act without thinking, or that impulsively. They _do_ have Andrew Waltfeld with them, among others; normally I would've expected them to know we could handle the situation ourselves."

She frowned thoughtfully. "They might have the wrong information," she mused, "and be operating under false assumptions…"

A snort from near the bow drew the attention of both to the black-uniformed woman by the forward viewport. "Some of their data might well be wrong," Arkanian said, not bothering to turn, "but I guarantee they have a completely accurate read on our tactical situation. They have _Dominion_ right with us, and while Kevin has always been more a fan of the brute force approach, his understanding of the subtleties of war is nearly at the level of his mentor, the Desert Tiger. No, whatever their reasoning may be, it's not because they didn't think we could handle ourselves."

Athrun gazed at the woman in silence for several moments. _I don't think I quite trust you, Commander Arkanian,_ he thought to himself. _I don't know what, exactly, Chairman Durandal had in mind by commissioning your "Phase II" unit, but I don't think it was a good idea… especially not with you in command. Your talk of getting Kevin to rejoin sounds a bit too much like talk of a "master race" for my liking… and I have the impression you don't really care what Kevin thinks about it._

"With all due respect, Commander Arkanian," he said, outwardly calm but with ice in his emerald eyes, "I don't believe this discussion concerns you, or your operation."

Delta blinked, momentarily nonplussed by the unexpected words. _Hm; looks like Hydra's opinions carry a bit more weight than I'd thought… though it _shouldn't_ have surprised me, considering how close they were._

"As you wish," she said simply, and fell silent.

Talia glanced between the two, puzzled by the byplay, but chose to let it pass; given Arkanian's duties, it was unlikely that any conflict between the two commanders would affect _Minerva_'s smooth operation, so it seemed wiser to simply let them sort it out between themselves.

"Anyway, Captain," Athrun said presently, as though the exchange had never taken place, "I agree that the _Archangel_'s actions were… strange. I also think Kevin is starting to do more harm than good here; at this rate, he _will_ end up killing Shinn, if only because Shinn won't leave him be. So…" He paused. "I'd like to meet with them, as soon as possible."

"…Are you sure about that, Athrun?" Talia asked, after a momentary hesitation. "After what happened during that last battle, I'm not sure they'd be very receptive. And could you even find them, for that matter? _Archangel_'s pretty elusive these days."

He shook his head. "Captain, I know Kira Yamato and Kevin Walker very well. They won't hold Shinn's actions against me… in part," he admitted, "because I suspect Kevin almost enjoyed it. Also, if anyone can convince them to back off a little, I can. And as for finding them…" He shrugged. "That won't be a problem. I… have my ways of getting in touch with Kevin, and he can handle things from there."

At that statement, Arkanian glanced up… then looked away again before Athrun could catch her glance. _I doubt that man would willingly tell me what his "ways" are, considering his reaction a few moments ago. Pity; finding a way around Kevin's current locator encryption would be useful… but, I suppose, counterproductive. Well, another time…_

Talia, meanwhile, took but a few moments to think on Athrun's request. _He_ does _have a point,_ she admitted to herself. _Not many can get through to Colonel Walker when he's set his mind on something; this is potentially the only way, especially considering the influence the Colonel clearly has in_ Archangel_'s decision making. Besides…_

"I don't have any authority to refuse your request anyway," she said at length, with a small shrug of her own. "As we're both in FAITH, we're technically on even terms now. Even if we weren't, though, I'd approve it. _Archangel_'s independent actions represent an unnecessarily chaotic element; at the least, convincing Colonel Walker to exercise some restraint would be very helpful."

Athrun nodded gratefully. "Thank you, Captain. In that case, I'll take care of a few arrangements, then leave in a few hours in the Savior. I don't know how long this will take, though; I might be gone as long as a day or two."

Talia actually smiled at that, albeit wearily. "Athrun, considering the shape we're in, I don't think that's going to be a problem. It would take a miracle greater than Colonel Walker's resurrections to get _Minerva_ ready for combat again within the next two weeks, let along two days. Take as long as you need."

"Thank you, Captain." Coming briefly to attention, Athrun snapped up his hand in salute, then turned away, walking to the Bridge hatch.

* * *

Walking back through _Minerva_'s corridors toward his quarters, Athrun couldn't help but shake his head wearily. _Everything is getting so complicated these days,_ he thought. _This war… it's even more complicated than the last one. Everything seems to clear-cut on the surface, but underneath…_

What had once been a simple matter of the PLANTs defending themselves from the Earth Alliance's aggression had become something far more complex, even if most people didn't even realize it. On the fringes of the conflict, Athrun now knew, John Tyler Onishi plotted, working toward unknown goals with the aid of a small army of clones, a genetically-engineered virus, and weapons Athrun couldn't begin to guess at; he wondered sometimes how Kevin remained sane, dealing with such problems on top of the war itself.

_Then there's Arkanian, and her people,_ he mused. _Bringing ABADDON back online… What does Chairman Durandal intend to do with them? We're acting in aggressive self-defense, so I guess he may intend for them to fight off any Earth Alliance Destroyers; certainly it's something to worry about… but what worries_ me _is what Delta intends to use them for. From what Kevin said, she's entirely capable of acting without the Chairman's prior approval, so_ her _agenda might be entirely different…_

Then, of course, there was Meer Campbell, and _her_ role in things. Athrun was far from certain about that matter; he'd been uneasy from the moment Durandal explained the situation to him, and her actions in Diocuia had served mostly to make his life harder, in her overzealous attempts to maintain her cover. Nor did it help that her impersonation of Lacus Clyne -which, in his opinion, was borderline identity theft at the very least- was a source of constant anger for Kevin… a man not noted for his moderation when sufficiently irritated.

_Not only is she making my life harder, and widening a potential rift between us, but she might well get herself killed in the process,_ he thought grimly._ If she goes much farther, I don't doubt Kevin's capable of taking direct action. He probably wouldn't_ kill _her -not yet, anyway- but he might well expose her… or even kidnap her, since he seems to be viewing her as a military target._ He sighed. _This has the potential to turn into a disaster all by itself…_

And, to top it all off, there was Shinn Asuka. Hotheaded, insubordinate, and arrogant, he reminded Athrun all too much of Yzak, during the first war… except without the discipline that kept Yzak from going_completely_ off the deep end.

That combination of traits, when put together with Shinn's unfortunate history with Kevin, had turned into the greatest recipe for disaster that Athrun had seen in quite a long time. Bad enough that Kevin was connected with Orb, but the accidental death of Shinn's family at Stormhawk's hands… and, Athrun had to admit, Kevin's own attitude didn't help. He couldn't quite call it arrogance -after all, Kevin really was better than a "normal" human like Shinn- but it certainly bordered on that.

_And it doesn't help that Cagalli is so visible on the _Archangel, Athrun admitted unhappily. _If there's anything Shinn hates even more than Kevin, it's the Athha family…_

He sighed. Much as he didn't like it, he knew he had no choice but to contact the _Archangel_ now, and try to convince them to back off. Whatever their motives were, they were making a mistake, and it was one that _would_ cost people their lives soon enough.

As he approached the _Minerva_'s personnel section, Athrun reached into a pocket, withdrawing a small transmitter; from another, he then pulled out a computer chip, which he promptly slid into a port on the transmitter.

He never noticed a puzzled Lunamaria Hawke, who had poked her head out of the crew lounge in time to see him bring out the transmitter… and remained in earshot as he activated it.

* * *

Leaning against the _Archangel _Bridge's starboard bulkhead, Kevin was conversing idly with Kira and Cagalli, when a sudden_ click_ sounded in his head, and he broke off mid-sentence.

Kira and Cagalli both looked at him in concern; there shouldn't have been anything to get his attention that way, not when the _Archangel_ was sitting on the bottom of the sea. Even a Destroyer wouldn't have been able to get that deep without something large enough to be noticed, like a mobile suit.

"Kevin," Cagalli began, "are you okay?"

Kevin raised a hand, indicating that he was fine… and pressed his human hand to his left mastoid area, a habit the others recognized from the infrequent occasions when his internal quantum radio link was accessed.

_"Kevin,"_ the receiver said, _"it's me, Athrun. Do you read me?"_

Kevin's eyes widened for an instant, then narrowed. "Just fine, Athrun," he subvocalized. "…Though at the moment, I can't think of any reason _why_ you'd be contacting me just now, considering the circumstances."

The momentary pause on the other end showed his remark hadn't been lost on his friend; Athrun was all too well aware that Kevin didn't approve of his decision to rejoin ZAFT. _"We need to talk, Kevin,"_ Athrun said after a moment. _"Face to face… preferably with Kira and Cagalli, as well."_

The super-soldier's eyes narrowed still farther. "About what, exactly?" he asked cautiously.

_"The current situation, and recent events,"_ Athrun replied vaguely. _"I'd rather not be more specific over this channel; these days, you never know who might be listening in. But this is very important, Kevin. Life and death important."_

Kevin hesitated only briefly. He knew Athrun well, after all this time; whatever his qualms about Athrun's current allegiance, he knew better than to think the pilot would say that it was a matter of life and death if he wasn't absolutely certain of it.

"All right," he agreed. "When and where?"

_"As soon as possible,"_ Athrun replied, a tinge of relief in his voice; he'd expected a bit more of an argument, under the circumstances._"I'm transmitting a location to your cortical implant's nav system; it's nice and out of the way, so you should be able to get Nemesis in there without a problem."_

"Understood. I'll be there in a few hours; I'll speak to Kira and Cagalli about it in a moment."

_"Thanks."_ Athrun paused. _"And… be careful, Kevin. Whatever our disagreements may be right now, I'm starting to think you're right about Arkanian."_

Kevin's chuckle was quiet, and not at all humorous. "Oh, I'm right, Athrun, I assure you. I'll tell you all about it… in person. Walker out."

When he lowered his hand and returned his attention to his immediate surroundings, he found just about everyone looking at him in concern._Reasonable enough, I guess,_ he admitted to himself. _Lately, quantum signals usually haven't been good news._

"Was that Arkanian?" Murrue asked, frowning in concern. "Or Carnehan?"

Kevin quickly shook his head. "No, it wasn't a Destroyer, Phase I or otherwise. That was actually Athrun, using the frequency chip I gave him a few years back."

Kira blinked in surprise. "Athrun? Why would he have been contacting you that way? I thought he'd be busy right now, especially after the damage _Minerva_ took in that last battle."

His friend shrugged. "That's what I thought, too… but it sounds like he's a bit more concerned about _us_ at the moment. He wants to meet with us… and soon. You, Cagalli, and me."

In one respect, that was actually reassuring; the request for a private meeting with only three members of the group indicated that the proposed was not a trap Athrun had been maneuvered into; likewise, the implied presence of both Nemesis and Freedom mitigated against the possibility, since few people would willingly challenge either mobile suit, let alone both at once.

_Still…_

Murrue rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "I would suppose he's concerned about our actions during that last battle, and I can understand that; our actions were, perhaps, a little less clear than we intended, mostly thanks to that idiot Seiran. Still… can we be _certain_ this isn't a trap? We know all too well that certain elements, like Arkanian, would gladly use this as a chance to get at at least some of us, even without Athrun's knowledge. He's not the only one who knows how to use that comm channel, you know."

"True enough," Kevin conceded. "Even Athrun seemed concerned about Arkanian listening in; and her actions when last we met indicates she might be able to influence my body at close range. Still, I don't really think even she could affect me with Nemesis on hand."

"And even if she could," Kira put in quietly, "there's still Freedom to consider. I don't have any implants at all; the only way she could possibly affect me is through my link with Kevin, and I don't think it works that way. And even if it did, no one outside our group even knows about it."

"Right," Cagalli agreed. "Murrue, I know it's a bit of a risk… but I think we should meet him." Her expression turned dark. "If nothing else, I want to give him a piece of _my_ mind about his decision to rejoin ZAFT. After everything we've seen, especially that fake Lacus, he'd better have a good reason for this."

"He already told me, remember?" Kevin pointed out. "When I talked to him on the _Minerva,_ in the Indian Ocean."

Behind him, Andy chuckled. "Yeah, sure… but considering the kind of temper you were in at the time, Racher, I doubt the answer was quite as detailed as it might've been."

Murrue couldn't stifle a chuckle herself, seeing Kevin's chagrined expression. It was true, she had to admit, that while Kevin's temper was infinitely better controlled than Shinn Asuka's, it also tended to have something of an intimidating effect even on his friends. Knowing Kevin's age-old grudge against ZAFT -and his past experience fighting Athrun as _part_ of ZAFT- he had probably been in a sufficiently bad mood that Athrun had given him only the basics, just enough to mollify Kevin enough to keep him from doing anything drastic.

_That's my brother for you,_ she thought, with fond exasperation. _Very dangerous, utterly loyal to those he loves… and about as reassuring as an enraged bull, when his buttons are pushed._

"Well," Murrue said at last, "if you three think it's a good idea, then_I'm_ not about to argue with you. But… be careful, will you? Even with Nemesis and Freedom, there's always the chance you'll encounter something unusually dangerous… like Leviathan."

Kira nodded soberly. "We know, Murrue, and we'll keep an eye out… but I really don't think this is a trap. I know Athrun better than that." He turned to Kevin. "So, have you heard anything else about what Dortmund is up to?" he asked, bringing the conversation back to the original subject.

Kevin shrugged. "Not really. She's been open about most of her activities over the last few years, but, like Hyperion, she's been pretty cryptic about her current goals…"

* * *

"Your current mission is simple," Arthur Trine told the two pilots seated before him, and gestured at the wall map. "Recent intelligence from the locals has brought to light suspicions regarding a nearby research lab. Originally operated by the Eurasian Federation, it was later taken over by the Earth Alliance, for purposes yet unknown; your mission is to investigate it, and find out what those purposes were."

Shinn Asuka snorted. "They're sending us in for _that?"_ he said dismissively. "What a lame mission to waste Impulse on."

To his right, Rey Za Burrel shot him a warning look. "Watch your tone, Shinn," he reprimanded quietly. "Superior officers are due a little respect."

Trine was unsurprised to see the scolding had little affect on Shinn; he'd read the young pilot's academy record, after all. Not, of course, that he intended to let the remark pass unchallenged, either. _His skill is commendable, _he thought, _but his attitude is atrocious, sometimes…_

"It most certainly is _not_ 'lame'," he said sharply. "Nor is it a waste of Impulse's time. There's apparently been a lot of vehicular traffic in and around that led within the last two weeks… including visitations from mobile suits. Considering _Minerva_'s current status, I trust you understand the potential danger of enemy mobile suits operating in close proximity to Tarcuius."

_…He's got a point there,_ Shinn admitted unwillingly. Having seen for himself the terrible damage to _Minerva_'s bow, he knew having to deal with an Earth Alliance attack just then would be bad; even with_Dominion_'s forces augmenting their defenses, it wouldn't take much to cause great harm. Even one missile, were it to slip through, would wreak untold havoc aboard the wounded ship.

"All right," he said at length, "I can see why we're going… but why are _those_ guys supporting us? Why not our own pilots?" He gestured irritably toward the two figures standing to one side; only one truly drew his ire these days, but even that was enough.

"Heine's injuries are still too great for him to participate in anything potentially hazardous," Trine replied, unruffled. "He's been released to his quarters, but he remains far from battle ready. As for Commander Zala and Lunamaria, my understanding is that they both have pressing matters elsewhere. Moreover…"

"Moreover," the armored soldier known as Invictus drawled, "Jack and I have a bit of a history with mysterious labs. I'm an assassin, not a geneticist, but if there's anything resembling a mad scientist's opium dream there, between the two of us I'm sure we'll recognize it."

"Besides," Jack Carter interjected quietly, "scuttlebutt we've dug up indicates old man Onishi had some dealings in Eurasia in the past. Considering our… situation, the assassin and I have a vested interest in the place."

"Precisely," Trine concurred. "Their experience may prove invaluable… and in the event of a trap, they're more capable than either of you in a firefight."

Shinn shrugged, getting to his feet. "Maybe so," he admitted, "but still… Even if this isn't a total waste of time, I'm not expecting any trouble around here. They're probably still busy dealing with all the breakaway factions." He glanced at the clones. "Just remember one thing: if there's any mobile suit trouble, leave it to us. You're not pilot, Invictus; and while I know you're a hot hand in a mobile suit yourself, Carter, I think you'll have your own matters to deal with."

Somewhat to Trine's surprise, neither man took offense. Invictus merely raised an eyebrow, while Carter simply said, "Probably so."

He might've been more concerned by the remark had he known that Carter's intention was to vacuum the lab's databases, in hopes of finding any information that could be used to help stop his own genetic countdown.

* * *

_Well,_ Athrun thought, typing commands into Savior's startup system, _here goes nothing. I hope Cagalli can keep Kevin's temper in check; the last thing I need is a forty-five caliber hole someplace important… and in the long run, it wouldn't do Kevin much good, either. The last thing_ he _needs is to make even more enemies on the _Minerva.

As Savior's systems came to life, he conceded that Kevin's idiosyncratic ways _were_ coming in handy in one respect. He would've been uneasy leaving _Minerva_'s defense solely in Shinn's hands, despite the younger pilot's undeniable skill; _Dominion_'s presence mitigated against that. After all, not even the Earth Alliance would be inclined to tangle with an _Archangel_-class mobile assault ship without a _very_ pressing reason…

_Which is all well and good,_ Athrun thought darkly, as the subject came back to the matter at hand, _but that's not _all _he's doing. If it was, I'd be grateful; I could even handle him going vigilante on the Earth Forces… if he'd just do it somewhere _else. _I have to stop them before they make the situation even worse than last time…_

Savior's cockpit displays came to life around him, and Athrun fed power into the machine's limbs. "This is Athrun Zala," he called, keying his radio. "I'm heading for the catapult now. Please open the hatch as I arrive."

_"Understood, Commander,"_ Meyrin replied from the Bridge. _"Good luck, Sir."_

"Thanks; I may need it." He'd not spoken to anyone of exactly what his mission was, and only Talia and Arkanian had been on the Bridge when he'd first brought it up, but Meyrin had by now learned enough about Kevin Walker and the _Archangel _to at least guess at what Athrun was about to attempt.

_At least I've got _someone _to talk to,_ he thought wryly, and walked Savior through the hangar's hatch out to the starboard catapult. _About the only other person on board that I speak frankly to about this whole mess is Alec, and he's usually so moody_ I _get depressed…_

Not to mention that the man had a very, very low opinion of one of Athrun's best friends.

"Athrun here," he said then, speaking into his link with the Bridge. "Savior, launching."

On the deck behind him, Alec King and several other mechanics watched as Savior's thrusters roared to life. Blue-white fire poured out of them, and with a flex of its knees the mobile suit hurled itself into the sky. Converting swiftly to mobile armor mode, it streaked away, leaving _Minerva_ far behind.

Just as he departed, though, a hatch slid aside, and Luna burst into the hangar, slightly disheveled. "Is he gone?" she demanded. "Where is he going?"

Her outburst was met with raised eyebrows, and Alec turned a curious look on her. "Something wrong, Lunamaria?" he asked. _Because you look almost like you think he's heading off to meet with the enemy,_ he added silently. _Hm… do you have some idea of his errand, I wonder?_

Luna twitched, then glanced away, as though realizing she'd said more than she intended. "N-no, it's nothing, Kyle," she said, much more quietly than her original outburst. "I'm just wondering where he thinks he's going, at a time like this."

The Basilisk shrugged. "The Commander's business is presumably of some importance, but that's about all I can say; they don't tell us mechanics much. I doubt it's really that big a deal, though, seeing as how _Minerva_'s not going anywhere anytime soon."

"Hm… maybe so," she conceded. "Well… maybe Meyrin knows." Turning away, she walked slowly back to the hatch… though not before muttering, so quietly only Alec's ears could hear, "I need to find out what's going on…"

* * *

"So, how's it look, Chief?" Kevin asked, looking up at Nemesis' still, silent form. "Everything back in order, I hope?"

"Yep, just about," Kojiro Murdoch confirmed with a grin. "That gash near the cockpit was taken care of by the auto-repair easily enough, and we just got done replacing the autocannon Impulse wrecked. That thing stills scares me half to death, but if you run into anything nasty, the old bird's ready for it."

The super-soldier smiled gratefully. "Glad to hear it, Chief; especially since Nemesis will be carrying two this time. I don't mind risking my _own_ life, but I'm not about to take Cagalli up in it without being absolutely sure of its condition."

"And you're also not running that reactor of yours while I'm with you," Cagalli informed him, slipping her arm through his. "You got that? Fission power as long as I'm in it, not that antimatter deathtrap you're so fond of."

"As you will it, My Lady," Kevin conceded, his aggrieved look somewhat spoiled by his chuckle. "No matter annihilation today."

Kira, standing near the Freedom, shook his head in amusement at the byplay. In this case, he had to agree with Cagalli: Nemesis was almost insanely powerful, but that very power had some definite drawbacks; Kevin had already nearly obliterated himself with it, in Scandinavia, and there was no guarantee something of the sort wouldn't happen again.

(_She's got a point, Kevin,_) he told his friend silently. (_Brute force isn't always the answer; and with you, that usually means blowing up_everything _in the area. Nemesis isn't exactly meant for finesse even when you don't have that antimatter reactor going._)

(_True,_) Kevin conceded, (_but that's partly because it's still built on Stormhawk's frame. Foxhound, if you'll recall, is meant to be a bit more precise… which is one reason I'm _glad _I've got all that power on hand. We'll need it if that maniac brother of mine should show up again._)

"You do know how strange you two look when you're doing that, don't you?" Leona Colde said dryly, walking into the hangar. "You've got all the visible signs of a conversation… but in absolute silence. An uninformed observer would probably think you were trying to hypnotize each other, mon ami."

"Good thing I don't really care what other people think," Kevin replied, voice dry as rock. "Glad to see you, Leona. You know what's going on, I presume?"

She snorted. "You're not the only one who knows how Destroyer interlinks work these days, mon ami; I was listening in when Athrun contacted you. I _am_ a Phase-III operative, remember. So yes, I know… and I presume you want me to keep an eye on things from a distance."

He nodded. "Exactly. I'd prefer you stay close enough to the_Archangel _to intervene here if need be -after we leave, the only suits here will be yours and Andy's Murasame- but it would probably be a good idea if you were close enough to find us in the event something like Leviathan turns up."

"Yeah," Cagalli agreed somberly. "After what happened last time…" She shrugged, not needing to remind Leona of the crippling damage Nemesis had sustained in battle with its more advanced brother.

The older woman smiled faintly, and nodded. "Roger that, then. I'll be on hand if anything… nasty should occur." She stepped forward, and clapped Kevin on the shoulder. "And now _you, _mon ami, should be on your way. I've a feeling that this is one meeting you really shouldn't be late to…"

* * *

Off the coast of Turkey, far enough into the Sea of Marmara not to be seen from land, the great white hull of the rogue Mobile Assault Ship_Archangel _slowly rose into view, surfacing for the first time since the Battle of the Dardanelle Straight, days earlier.

Many a ZAFT team commander would've been grateful for the chance, had they seen it; being completely unsupported by any nation, the _Archangel_would've been a tempting target… but she did not intend to remain so vulnerable for long, and no sane commander would've launched the attack -at least, not without overwhelming numbers- upon seeing what happened next.

_Archangel_'s twin catapult hatches lifted open, and two machines streaked into the sky under the impetus of magnetic acceleration. One was black and white, with ten graceful wings; the feared shape of Freedom was infamous on any battlefield, well-remembered by any who had seen even visual records of its battles, let alone seen it firsthand. Although its pilot almost never killed, none doubted that he was entirely capable of it if he felt the need.

The other unit was black as outer space, with traces of red trim, and though it currently resembled a conventional fighter aircraft, many knew it in another, more menacing form. Rapidly gaining infamy of its own on the battlefield, Nemesis' pilot was not known for mercy… or ineffectiveness. The raw power of his new steed merely increased his already formidable ability as an "avatar of the Grim Reaper".

This day, though, neither was bound for battle; instead, with weapons powered down, they turned south, increased thruster power, and winged off toward a war of words, rather than beams… and as they did so, one final machine rose up from _Archangel_'s deck.

Colored to resemble a suit of plate armor, its ancestry would've been apparent to any pilot from the latter stages of the first war. With its basic frame resembling that of Nemesis, any could see that they were from the same series, and many would recognize it as a variant of the original Stormhawk design.

Leona Colde's model, codenamed "Saber", was in fact very close to the design of Kevin's old mobile suit… but with a special feature that made it ideal for its current mission, should the enemy they feared actually arrive.

Inside its cockpit, Leona sighed, watching her comrades fly onward. "Godspeed, mon ami," she whispered. "Be careful out there, and come back soon; this machine is good, but I don't fancy trying to defend against a major attack all by myself…"

_"Agreed,"_Murrue said, appearing on a communications monitor. _"You proved yourself a formidable opponent even for Leviathan, Leona, but I'm not sure you could _quite _take it down alone. And besides…"_ She sighed. _"It's always hard, watching them go out. Especially when_Archangel _is staying behind, so far from whatever's going on."_

Leona nodded. "You can't see the action with your own eyes, and the remaining N-jammer interference means you usually can't even get radio reports of what's happening, eh, Mon Capitan?"

_"Exactly. You never know… how many are going to come back."_ Murrue's eyes took on a faraway look. _"One thing I've learned from my years of war, Leona: when you see the pilots go out on a mission, you never know how many bunks are going to be empty that night… how many of those you care for aren't coming back. You know what I mean?"_

The younger woman was silent for a long, long moment, as she, too, remembered her losses. She knew the story of Murrue Ramius' first love, a mobile armor pilot who'd gone out to battle at First Jachin and never returned… and of Mu La Flaga, the mobile _suit _pilot who'd been ambushed after the war, and killed by Blue Cosmos…

"Yes, Murrue," Leona said at last, remembering the Battle of Alaska, "I know. Believe me, I know all too well…"

* * *

_There's something about evil laboratories,_ Invictus thought, _that sets them apart from any other structure known to man… and not in a good way._

Several kilometers outside Tarcuius, the Impulse, Rey's ZAKU Phantom -riding a standard-issue Guul subflight platform and ZGMF-X09A Justice swept in toward the abandoned laboratory, streaking through the evening sky with no sound but their own thrusters. The assassin Invictus, for once without his armor and riding atop Justice's subflight lifter, would've found the situation very peaceful… had he not known, generally, what to expect from the facility they were approaching.

"'I am become Death, the Destroyer of worlds,'" Carter whispered from Justice's cockpit, as he gazed down at the darkened building. Bringing the machine down to a landing, even he felt an undeniable chill… one stemming from his own memories of the ABADDON laboratory.

"J. Robert Oppenheimer," Rey said curiously, identifying Carter's quote. "Fitting for the atmosphere, I guess, but I don't think is quite on the level of the first nuclear bomb, Carter." Carefully throttling back, he brought the Guul down to the ground, and the Phantom stepped off.

"You're wrong," Invictus whispered. "Depending on what we find in there, it could well rival the atomic bomb for significance… and destructive potential." Taking a deep breath, he stepped to the edge of the Fatum 00, and dropped to the ground below.

Behind them, the Impulse swooped nimbly in, braked, and came to a neat landing on one knee. Within moments, its brilliant VPS colors blurred, returning to the basic gray of standby status; after another pause, the hatch opened, and Shinn lowered himself to the ground.

Carter and Rey followed suit, and soon all four stood near the building's entrance… and not one of them was particularly eager to walk in. Even Rey, for all his own calm, felt uneasy about entering the dark, depressing interior, as though something evil really _did _emanate from within.

"…Well," Shinn said at length, voice soft, "I… guess we're not likely to find anything if we just stand here, are we?"

"…No," Invictus conceded unwillingly. "We're not." Sniffing at the air, he was the first to step forward, walking carefully through the shattered door… though he did so only after boosting his senses much higher than normal.

"This place… smells wrong," Carter whispered, unnerved but beginning to follow his "brother" anyway. "Invictus, this place…"

"I know." The assassin felt a shiver go down his spine. "There is something very, very wrong about this place."

Shinn looked at the pair curiously. "Do you two know something?" he asked, grateful for the distraction from the dark of the building's entrance foyer. "Something _we _should know?"

Invictus shrugged minutely. "Nothing for sure, no… but there's something unpleasantly familiar about this place. It smells like…" Trailing off, he paused… and then, startling Shinn half out of his skin, he_changed_, his muscles bulging outward, head shape-shifting around, and white, black-striped fur sprouting over his body, including the thrashing tail that had suddenly grown into existence. **"It smells like the place where I was born,"** he rumbled.

Shinn took a moment to regain his composure before replying; he'd seen a partial transformation before, but this was the first time he'd seen a zoanthrope make the complete change… and it didn't help that he'd forgotten that Invictus, too, had the latent tiger form within him.

"You mean it smells like… the ABADDON lab?" he asked, when he had forced away his unease.

**"Definitely,"** Invictus confirmed, stalking forward. **"It's not exactly the same -the ABADDON lab always had the stench of lubricants and heavy metals- but it's definitely similar. In fact…"**

The assassin trailed off, a look of intense concentration appearing on his feline features, and said no more. He simply resumed his progress into the interior, tail lashing as he cautiously sniffed the dank, musty air.

Shinn and Rey exchanged bemused looks, following in the wake of the super-soldiers. "That's just creepy," Shinn whispered. "The way he _changed…"_

"That's how they are," Rey replied with a shrug. "Don't forget, Shinn: they may look like us, but those two don't even consider themselves human. Their cybernetic augmentation and zoanthrope genes have changed them so much they don't believe themselves to be like the rest of us."

"That's because we're not, Za Burrel," Carter said sharply, cautiously edging past an open, darkened doorway. "Something you would do well to remember is that, while we may be just as mortal and prone to mistakes as you are, any Abaddon is a cut above any human." He glanced over his shoulder at them, expression unreadable. "Call it arrogance if you want, but the fact is that we're beyond you mere Coordinators, when it comes to physical strength."

Shinn bristled, genuinely offended by the assertion._ Beyond "mere" Coordinators?_ he thought angrily. _That sounds too much like Walker's talk… not to mention being too close to the idea of a "master race" for comfort! As if we're really so far below them, just because of their cybernetic enhancements-_

**"Take it easy, both of you,"** Invictus growled suddenly, coming to a halt at the entrance to a much larger chamber, right at the culmination of the entrance corridor. **"Jack, I finally recognize that stench. It's gamma glipheptin."**

The two ZAFT pilots looked blank, but Carter cursed vilely. "That evil stuff? Son of a… Invictus, do you realize what we've just stumbled on?"

**"Oh, yeah,"** the man-tiger rumbled quietly. **"As far as I know, only one group other than ABADDON ever used gamma glipheptin for anything, and we'd never been able to track down where they came from… until now."**

"Wait a second," Shinn interjected, frustrated by the cryptic exchange. "What are you talking about? What in the world is gamma glipheptin?"

"Performance-enhancing drug," Carter explained curtly. "Combined with limited cybernetic implants in their brains and glands, it raises a Natural's abilities to those of Coordinators; ABADDON briefly experimented with it, as well, in hopes of raising Destroyer combat ability even higher. Unfortunately, it also turned out to be mildly psychoactive, as well, leading to mental instability in those who use it… and it also has very, very nasty side effects. Anyone who takes gamma glipheptin becomes addicted, and when the drug wears off, you're hit with drug withdrawal from hell: severe pain, as well as neural degeneration. Without regular doses, you're left in constant agony, up until the point your nervous system shuts down."

"This has been done?" Shinn recoiled, horrified by the very idea. "What kind of sick bastards would _do _something like that? And _why?"_

**"Earth Forces, three years ago,"** Invictus said quietly. **"You saw them, Asuka: Calamity, Forbidden, and Raider. They were piloted by biological CPUs, soldiers regarded as equipment rather than people. Whatever truly happened on that day, during the Battle of Orb… those people were involved."**

The obsidian-haired pilot shivered, remembering the sight of the mobile suit's the assassin spoke of. Those three, Freedom, and Stormhawk… they were the ones he had seen just before the fateful blast. And he also vaguely remembered something about the Forbidden's backpack just as Stormhawk opened fire…

"It doesn't matter right now, Shinn," Rey said softly, resting a hand on Shinn's shoulder for a moment. "Even if they're right… we have to find out what that drug is doing _here_. That's our mission today, remember: to find out the purpose of this lab."

Shinn took a long, shuddering breath. "…Yeah," he agreed. "You're right. Let's go."

Taking flashlights from their belts and flicking them on, the two pilots advanced forward, stepping past the zoanthrope soldiers. It was clear that the chamber ahead was important; perhaps enough so that it would explain the facility's purpose without ever requiring them to delve further into the dark, foreboding interior.

Invictus and Carter exchanged a look then, both beginning to suspect what would be found ahead… but neither spoke up, knowing that if even if they were correct, words would not describe what lay before them.

Taking little notice of the way their allies hung back, Shinn and Rey advanced into the room, cautiously shining their lights around._Definitely a lab of some sort,_ Shinn thought, as the shaft of light illuminated a broken, shattered computer console. _But did this place really have anything to do with-_

The flashlight beams hit upon shattered, cylindrical tanks, and Shinn's eyes went wide. "What the… what _is _this?" he gasped, voice emerging as a strangled whisper. "W…what's going on here?"

In the tanks, curled up in the fetal position, lay the bodies of children… human children. Some of them riddled with bullet holes, they appeared only recently dead… and clearly the products of some kind of experimentation.

As the pilots stared in shocked horror, the two super-soldiers stepped carefully into the room. **"I thought I smelled death,"** Invictus uttered softly. **"Death, and gamma glipheptin… We were right: this is the place that produced Sabnak, Andras, and Buer. There can no longer be any doubt."**

Carter swallowed despite himself. "Yeah," he managed, voice almost inaudible. "This is-"

"Ugh!"

Three heads whipped around, distracted from the horrifying sight by the strangled cry of pain of one of their own, as Rey Za Burrel's eyes went wide, his muscles tensed, and his hands came up to clutch as his chest.

"What's wrong, Rey?" Shinn demanded, hurrying to his friend's side. "Rey? Answer me, Rey! What's wrong?"

"Heart attack?" Carter barked, gaze snapping back to his brother.

**"Unknown,"** Invictus replied flatly, staring intently at Rey. **"All the symptoms, but it doesn't make sense. Not so young-"**

Visibly shuddering now, Rey sank to his knees, breath coming in pained gasps, moans of pain emanating from him as he continued to clutch at his chest. "Not… not… now…" he gasped out, oblivious to Shinn's presence now. "Not… now…"

"Rey!" Shinn knelt at Rey's side, gripping the blonde pilot's shoulders, and thought furiously. "Rey, what is it?" His eyes snapped up to the two Destroyers. "Hurry! Call _Minerva! _He needs medical attention right away!"

"No argument here," Carter agreed readily, and quickly brought his radio implant to life… but as he did so, he exchanged a significant look with Invictus. Something wasn't right about this; it simply made no sense for someone Rey's age to be suffering a heart attack when apparently in the peak of health.

It appeared they had _another _mystery to investigate now…

* * *

The spit of rock jutting out into the sea was, by itself, completely unremarkable… which was, in the end, what made it perfect as a meeting place for four people who preferred not to be observed by anyone or anything. Its desolate anonymity would be their protection… even from the comrades of one of those meeting there.

It was not to remain completely unremarkable for long. No place that Freedom and Nemesis chose to visit could be considered unremarkable, if only by virtue of their own presence; such powerful units never went anywhere without a good reason.

Freedom was the first to land, touching down with its back against the cliff, minimizing its exposure as much as possible; even as its PSA vanished into inactive mode, Nemesis swept in, converted smoothly to mobile suit mode, and knelt before the cliff as well.

Rising out of Freedom's cockpit, Kira turned to face the cliff, a pensive look on his face. _Athrun… what is it that you're doing here? What do you want to talk about so badly? And… will you finally tell us the whole reason you rejoined ZAFT?_

He wasn't nearly as vehement on the subject as Kevin -whose hatred of ZAFT had once been rivaled only by Blue Cosmos- but he also couldn't easily forgive or forget that a Phase II ABADDON operative had nearly killed Lacus at the Onishi Mansion. Until he was certain Gilbert Durandal had had nothing to do with the attack, Kira could not trust ZAFT fully… and that left Athrun suspect, as well, if only by association.

Shaking his head, Kira grabbed hold of Freedom's zipline, stepped off the cockpit hatch, and began lowering himself to the ground. _I guess I'll find out soon enough,_ he thought. _Whatever it is that Athrun wants to see us about, we're going to find out in just a few minutes…_

By the time he reached the ground, Nemesis' hatch had already opened, allowing Cagalli to lower herself from the black machine's hatch. "You ready, Kevin?" she called back up, as the super-soldier had yet to emerge himself. "Athrun should be here any minute, you know."

"Yeah, I know," Kevin acknowledged, appearing at the lip of the hatch. "I'm ready." With about as much apparent concern as someone taking a set of stairs, he stepped off, dropping several meters to the ground as if they were nothing… which to him, especially in his current garb, it essentially was.

No longer in his usual civilian gear, Kevin had used the opportunity provided by the uneventful flight over to don the Mark VI Destroyer battlesuit he'd configured several days earlier, minus the helmet. He knew it was overkill for any threat he was likely to encounter here, even if Athrun was followed, but with the possibility of encountering the Leviathan -and the resurrected Michael Carnehan- he preferred to take no chances. With the possibility of Mike's body having been enhanced beyond Phase I norm, he deemed the battlesuit's armor and strength a wise precaution.

_Now,_Kevin thought grimly, _the only question is whether or not I can actually bring myself to kill him… but that's a question that can wait for another time, after I make sure not to beat Athrun to death._

"So," Kira remarked, once the three had gathered at the cliff base, "do you know when Athrun's going to get here? I don't see any sign of him yet."

Kevin paused, consulting his cortical implant. "He's still got five minutes before he can be considered late," he announced. "He's probably just being cautious; however irritated _he _might be with us, I know for a fact that there are certain elements of ZAFT who would like us _dead."_ He didn't bother to mention Shinn Asuka; considering the number of unpleasant encounters the two had had in the past, he didn't need to.

"In that case, let's get moving," Cagalli suggested. "It's not going to be the easiest climb- uh!"

She broke off abruptly, for Kevin had grabbed hold of her shoulders, swung her around onto his back, and leapt straight up, catching a handhold an appreciable distance up the cliffside. Ignoring Cagalli's vociferous -and mildly objectionable- protests, the super-soldier proceeded to haul the both of them up with a level of agility few normal humans could match.

Kira swallowed a laugh at his friend's actions (not to mention his sister's threats of bodily harm), and, shaking his head, began the ascent himself… though not with the reckless pace Kevin preferred._Showoff, _he thought fondly. _If there's a superhuman way something can be done, he can't resist it; sometimes that Destroyer arrogance_ does _show through a little… if only when the situation gets ridiculous…_

Halfway up the cliff, Kevin paused in his climb briefly, head cocked to one side as though listening to something. "We've got incoming," he informed his companions, frowning in concentration. "I hear approaching engines… and I'm getting an electromagnetic signature consistent with that of a mobile suit with VPS activated."

Kira glanced over, eyebrow raised. "You can tell it's VPS from this far out?"

Kevin flashed an "aw-shucks" grin. "Well… actually, I can only tell that it's PSA of some kind. But really, the only machines that_don't _use VPS these days are ours and a couple of rogue suits, none of which match the _rest _of the energy signature."

Cagalli shook her head. "Same old Kevin," she muttered under her breath. "Well, don't get so focused on the mobile suit that you let _us_fall off, got it?"

"As you command, My Lady."

It didn't take long for them to reach the cliff top; the trio came up over the lip more or less simultaneously (Kevin having slowed down in deference to Cagalli's unaugmented sensibilities), and took a moment to catch their collective breath. Now that they had arrived, all that remained was for the one who'd requested the meeting in the first place to make his appearance… and that wait was not a long one.

As Kevin had predicted, it didn't take long for another mobile suit to come into view. Red with white trim, carried along by twin engines and swept wings, the machine arrived in mobile armor configuration, but quickly transitioned to mobile suit mode for landing, swooping in with a flair and precision those watching were unaccustomed to seeing from the pilot.

Apparently unconcerned with stealth just now, the pilot didn't bother to hide his machine. He simply deactivated his VPS, cut main power, and then popped the hatch… and Athrun Zala, once again in civilian clothing himself, lowered himself to the ground.

In a manner that struck Kira as eerily reminiscent of their meeting during the Battle of Orb, three years before, Athrun walked over to his waiting friends, and came to a stop precisely two meters away. His expression was unreadable, due in part to his dark sunglasses… and his emotions were a mystery even to Kevin, for he now employed the techniques Kevin himself had taught to block any kind of empathy.

"Hi, Athrun," Kira said, when the silence began to stretch out. "It's good to see you again."

"…Same here," Athrun agreed, and pulled off his shades. "I just wish this meeting were under better circumstances."

"So you're here to ask us about what happened the other day, right?" Cagalli asked, eyes narrow. "Because if you are, Athrun, I don't have any regrets about that. We only did what we had to, that's all."

"Are you sure about that?" he countered, glancing at each of them in turn. "Do you even realize what you did out there? We had everything under control until the _Archangel _turned up, and all hell broke loose! Why were you even there in the first place?"

"It didn't look under control to _me, _Athrun," Kira replied quietly. "It looked to me like _Minerva _was outnumbered by a lot, even with_Dominion_'s forces added to the mix. Or at least, I can't see any_other _reason you would've resorted to using a positron cannon on them."

"So what if we did?" Athrun shot a significant look at Kevin. "Look, I'm no fonder of them than you are, but I seem to remember Kevin using them for that kind of thing himself, more than once, and I_don't _remember either of you ever criticizing him for doing it. We may have had to use the Tannhauser, but we _did _have everything under control… and it would've ended a lot earlier if you hadn't stopped us."

"It would also have killed over a thousand Orb soldiers, Athrun," Kevin pointed out, entering the conversation at last. "Soldiers of your own adopted nation, who were only there because the Seirans betrayed them by allying with the Earth Forces. Would you have killed them for that, Athrun?"

"You think I like the idea?" Athrun demanded in return. "I know about betrayal as well as anyone, Kevin, and so do you… but I don't remember that stopping either one of us at Jachin. This is a war, and we all do things we'd rather not. Survival comes first." He raised a hand then, forestalling protest. "Okay, look, I know you_did _have a vested interest there; I'm not stupid enough to deny that the heads of two of the Five Noble Families, one of them the Chief Representative herself, have every right to be involved in a battle like that. But it doesn't make it _smart, _Kevin!"

Cagalli snorted. "It worked, didn't it?" She raised a hand then, forestalling Athrun's inevitable protest. "I know, I know, just because something works doesn't mean it wasn't stupid to try it in the first place. But, Athrun… what choice do we have? I'm still the Chief Representative, you know, even if Yuna claims I'm an imposter; if I stand by and let Orb soldiers die like that when I_know _I can do something about it, what kind of leader does that make me?"

He sighed, shaking his head. "I understand, but… Look, you guys, you saw what happened in that battle. Heine was nearly killed, Shinn went completely berserk, and the _Minerva _suffered severe damage… and thirty-three people were injured, fifteen fatally. I know you have to do what you can for Orb soldiers, but you have to consider what happens to _others _on the battlefield."

"You're wrong," Kira said quietly, shaking his head. "Sorry, Athrun, but that's not how it is at all. As Chief Representative of Orb, Cagalli's first responsibility is to her own people; cold as it may be, _Minerva _is secondary to that, no matter the danger. And you know as well as we do that the most that could be said of _Archangel_'s involvement in _Minerva_'s damage is that we prolonged the battle long enough for it to happen. We weren't directly responsible for any of it."

Athrun opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again, forcing himself to think before he spoke. _He has a point there,_ he admitted to himself._I told Shinn that myself… but it's also true there _are _problems with the approach they're taking, ones which could hurt them as well as us._

"Okay," he acknowledged at last, "I can see where you're coming from. I can even understand about your priorities; I guess it's just a little hard for me to take, considering my current position. But… Look." He took a deep breath, and turned to look directly at Kevin. "I can understand why you assigned _Dominion _to help us out. I'm even grateful, especially since there's a good chance Heine would be dead now if it weren't for Carter. But Kevin… couldn't _you_at least stay away? There are few people I'd rather have on my side in a fight -at least, if I'm not very interested in taking prisoners- but you have to know by now the kind of reaction Shinn has to your presence."

The super-soldier snorted. "No offense, Athrun, but that's not my problem. If Asuka is feeling suicidal, that's his problem, not mine; I'd rather not have to shoot him, but I have to admit I'm not as averse to the idea as I might be."

"Well, you _should _be!" Athrun shot back, exasperated. "Kevin, I know you're a hot hand in a mobile suit, and I know Shinn's temper gets in the way of his fighting, but for all that you make the unsurvivable survivable, you're _not _invincible… and I somehow don't think Nemesis is quite as stable as you'd like. One of these days, even Shinn will get lucky, and then what happens?"

"I don't think you want to know that, Athrun," Kevin replied evenly, a slight chill in his bright jade eyes. "Nor am I inclined to explain at the moment. But if Asuka ever _does _get lucky… well, he won't be all that lucky at all."

To his right, Kira winced; unlike Athrun, he knew the secret of Nemesis' power. _I'll say he won't be lucky,_ he thought uneasily. _And if Nemesis ever _does _blow, I really, really hope it's too high up to destroy anything important…_

Before Athrun's puzzled look could lead to any awkward questions, Cagalli spoke up again. "Leaving aside Kevin's affect on Shinn, Athrun," she began, "what _would _you think we should do? You know this is my responsibility, so…"

"…My first choice would be for you to return to Orb," Athrun replied at length, looking down at the ground. "If you could regain control there, you wouldn't have to come out here at all. Failing that… I'd at least ask you to coordinate your efforts with _Minerva, _so that there at least wouldn't be as much confusion on the battlefield next time."

In some ways, he actually did hope they'd do just that; certainly the_Archangel_'s firepower would be a welcome addition to _Minerva_'s own, assuming Shinn could be kept in check. And, of course, he'd welcome the chance to fight alongside Kevin and Kira once again…

But Kira shook his head. "Sorry, Athrun," he said, genuinely apologetic, "but we can't do that. You know our concerns about the Destroyer attack at the Mansion; until we know one way or the other about who ordered that attack, we can't afford to take that chance. If it was Durandal, we can't trust ZAFT at all… and even if it was just Arkanian, well, we couldn't risk joining up with the _Minerva _as long as she's aboard."

A hundred meters away, crouched on higher ground and mostly hidden by a rock outcropping, a shotgun microphone registered the accusation, and Lunamaria Hawke's eyes went wide. _An attack on Walker's home?_ she thought, shocked. _An attack… by Destroyers? Wait a minute… just what's going _on _with them?_

Somewhat to her surprise, Athrun didn't look startled by the allegation; he merely glanced away, his expression a mixture of resignation and uncertainty. Clearly, he'd already known about it, probably from Walker's brief visit to the _Minerva _in the Indian Ocean.

"…I won't deny you've got reason to be uncertain," Athrun said reluctantly. "I'll even admit those clearly were ZAFT personnel. But I've been doing some thinking: considering how independent-minded Destroyers tend to be, isn't it possible that it was rogue action, not sanctioned by the Chairman or Arkanian?"

Kevin's chilly expression didn't warm at all. "Neat theory, Athrun, but I'm afraid I have additional evidence against Arkanian now. Remember the meeting I told you about last time we met? The one Delta arranged in Ukraine?"

"Yeah," Athrun acknowledged carefully. "What about it?"

"The purpose of that meeting was to attempt to convince me to abandon the_Archangel _and join the Phase II ABADDON unit," Kevin informed him levelly. "And when I refused, Delta proceeded to batter me to near-unconsciousness, eventually managing a temporary short-circuit of my nervous system. At that point, she attempted to hack into my onboard database, after which she intended to haul me back to ZAFT whether I liked it or not."

In her rocky hiding place, Luna gasped. _Commander Arkanian… actually tried to force Walker back into ZAFT? Even if we wanted_ anything _to do with him, that isn't the way to do it… but then, from her reputation, I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. Destroyers always play by their own rules…_

Athrun took it no better than she did; somewhat worse, in fact. "She did_what?"_ he demanded. "What did she think she was doing?"

"Protecting the interests of the Abaddon, I suspect," Kevin said coldly. "Beware of her, Athrun: her ultimate interests may not coincide with yours, even should you continue to follow ZAFT's ideals. Natalya Ivanova Arkanian's primary loyalty is, and has always been, to the ABADDON unit, and she will do whatever she deems in their best interests."

"Now do you see, Athrun?" Cagalli interjected, deeming it time to balance Kevin's cold anger with some moderation. "We can't take the risk of joining forces with a ship that has _her _aboard; not when she's capable of doing something like _that."_

"…Point taken," Athrun conceded. "But still, that's no reason for you to act _completely _independently. If you were to coordinate your efforts with ZAFT, I'm sure the Chairman would arrange things to leave Orb to you; he's not like Arkanian-"

"And what about the other Lacus?" Kira interrupted, not unkindly. "You know there's a good chance her existence is the reason that attack on the real Lacus was ordered, whoever it was that did it. And she's out there all the time, pretending to be Lacus, acting as a mouthpiece for Durandal. Maybe she's got some good ideas… but how much do you think a fake can be trusted?"

"I… but that's…" Athrun looked away again, trying to come up with a proper response… a task that was hampered by Kevin Walker's next words.

"Remember something, Athrun," he said quietly. "Meer Campbell is rapidly becoming her own worst enemy. As long as she exists, Lacus is at risk of another attempt to silence her… and her reputation is in ever greater danger." His eyes had turned to frozen jade. "I told you once before: if she gets out of line, either I will kill her myself, or I'll send Leona to do it for me; I'm sure she'd be eager to finish the job, considering how much respect she has for the _real_Lacus."

Athrun's hands flexed unconsciously, as he sought a suitable response to the cold-blooded threat… and as he did so, Luna's eyes had gone as wide as they physically could. _Lacus Clyne… is a fake?_ she thought, stunned. _But… but _how?_ Why? And if she is, then where's the _real _Lacus? And why would Walker go so far…?_

Luna was beginning to realize that there was a lot more going on in the war than she'd realized… and that those undercurrents could well be more dangerous than anything on the surface.

* * *

Three hundred eighty-four thousand kilometers above the ongoing argument, a single figure skulked through darkened corridors, moving through passages largely ignored during the night watch. His presence had not been ordered by his direct -and only- superiors; nor had his objective been authorized… but the inhumanly strong soldier paid little heed to that now.

Disabling security cameras as he went, the sandy-haired soldier swiftly made his way through the base's deserted back corridors and maintenance passageways, before eventually arriving at a hangar door. _Well, _he thought to himself, _here goes…_

Drawing back a fist, he smashed it into the door… and where Kevin Walker might merely have knocked it off its hinges, this man's punch propelled the door a dozen meters into the hangar itself, its momentum combining with the zero-g to eventually slam it into the opposite wall.

Ignoring the alarms that started blaring about unauthorized access, he kicked off from the deck, hurtling toward the hangar's sole occupant: the sleek, forward-swept-wing form of ZGMF-X15A/M Leviathan, currently stored in mobile armor mode.

In seconds, the soldier had struck the machine's fuselage, and now caught hold of it by the main hatch. _Technically, _he thought to himself, quickly laying a hand on the neural interface located next to the hatch, _this shouldn't be possible… but it looks like my masters don't know _quite _everything…_

Under any circumstances known to Gilbert Durandal and others connected to the ABADDON program, it should not have possible for the soldier to act in such an independent manner; the method by which his body remained functional should've prohibited any unauthorized actions at all.

_Unluckily for them,_ the soldier thought to himself, swinging himself in through the now-opened hatch, _they don't understand ZERO… and by the time they do, it'll be too late. I'll soon have finished Hydra… and once I have, I'll be able to rest, too…_

(_Indeed…_) A chuckle seemed to emanate from the Leviathan itself, as the soldier connected himself to its systems. (_Your existence is a fascinating one, Kraken; you are a warrior who will burn out as quickly as a leaf caught in a flame… but before you do, you will burn brightly indeed…_)

"That's the idea," the soldier concurred with a feral smile. "I don't know what _you'll _do after this -assuming you 'do' anything at all- but for me… this is the end. No more fighting, no more resurrections… just peace."

(_Indeed, Kraken. If you succeed in what you attempt… then my existence will be satisfied. At that point… well, I can _do _nothing on my own, but within my knowledge are the codes to remove the safety interlocks on the reactor system. When our task is finished, our existence shall end in a blaze of glory…_)

Michael Carnehan's smile grew wider… and fiercer. "That's right… so let's go!"

Even as security troops began to enter the hangar in response to the intrusion, the super-soldier known as the Kraken fed power into Leviathan's thrusters… and the deadly machine leapt forward, smashing its way out of the hangar and into the black of space, intent on its final mission…

* * *

Author's Note:

* * *

In the wake of the mutually-destructive Battle of the Dardanelle Strait, all sides take the time to regroup and recover from the damages suffered. Of them all, _Minerva_'s damages are the most severe… and thus, tempers begin to flare among members of her crew…

Meanwhile, Athrun Zala, tailed by Lunamaria Hawke, meets with his old friends from the _Archangel, _intent on finding a solution to the tension that has risen between them. In doing so, revelations and threats are exchanged… and high above, Michael Carnehan and his electronic ally fly toward the beginning of the end of a long, painful rivalry…

First off, I know this is extremely late; my apologies for that, but I daresay my writing will remain slower than usual for the foreseeable future. I'm beginning to recover, but my life is still very chaotic.

A small point about the chapter's events that I should mention now, lest someone complain about it: yes, Luna's seemingly inexplicable appearance during the meeting will be explained in the next chapter. It obviously won't be quite the same as in canon -which is one reason it wasn't mentioned in _this _chapter; I simply couldn't find a place for it- but it'll be there.

Finally, I realize this chapter may not be up to my usual standard, and it _is_somewhat slow, but as to the former, my writing is still recovering, and the latter is kind of unavoidable, considering what point in the series this is at.

All that said, I hope it's at least somewhat satisfactory; and in a few days, I'll be getting to work on the long-awaited battle in Cry of the Falcon. Till then, feedback on _this _would be appreciated. -Solid Shark


	25. Chapter 25: Leviathan Rising

I don't own anything except Kevin Walker, the Destroyers, Max, Frank Castile, and Meryl Steiglitz

Leona Colde also does not belong to me; she is the creation of arekuruu-inabikari-no-She

* * *

Athrun Zala gazed into Kevin Walker's hard, uncompromising eyes, and understood that the super-soldier meant exactly what he said. Not given to bluffs or hyperbole, if he said that he was considering having Meer Campbell assassinated, he was entirely sincere in the threat.

_And it doesn't help that I'm none too sure about her deception, either_, Athrun thought unhappily. _She's not even acting like the real Lacus, and the _way_ she isn't is causing me enough trouble as it is, even without Kevin's reaction…_

_Even so, though, her existence isn't enough evidence to prove Chairman Durandal was behind the attempt to assassinate Lacus. It looks bad, sure… but even with the creation of the Phase II operatives, I just can't see him going _that_ far…_

"Look, Kevin, Kira," he said at length. "I don't really like it either, okay? She isn't my fiancée anymore, but Lacus is still a close friend, and I'm no happier about Meer impersonating her than either of you. But that's just one aspect of the Chairman's current activities; it's not proof of anything else. And yes," he said quickly, as Kevin opened his mouth to protest, "I know that could -theoretically- be enough of a motive for him to try to get Lacus out of the way… but think about it! If the truth got out, it would reverse everything he's accomplished since becoming chairman. It would be insane for him to try that!"

"Not necessarily, Athrun," Kira disagreed quietly. "Not many people knew where Lacus was at the time; that's the only reason he was able to get away with using Meer in the first place. If they'd managed to bring down the entire mansion -and the Pax-19 could've done just that- there wouldn't have been any witnesses to say that Lacus was ever there at all."

Athrun closed his eyes, raised his right hand to his forehead, and rubbed his right temple wearily. I hate arguments like this. _Wheels within wheels… it always makes my head hurt. And I _don't_ like being at odds with them like this…_

"Kira," he said quietly, "we could argue about this all night, and never get anywhere. I might point out that to _completely_ wipe out knowledge of Lacus' whereabouts, he'd also have to take out Artemis -and even _I_ don't know where that is right now- but there's not really any point. Any conspiracy theory could be plausible here, if you work at it long enough." He spread his hands out, palm up. "All I can really say is that you should look at everything _else_ the Chairman's done since the new war started. Okay, so I'm not too sure about these 'Phase II' Destroyers, but even you have to admit he's not trying to deploy them offensively… and if he was really as bad as you're thinking, don't you think he would've sent them out first thing?"

_That_ argument gave his friends momentary pause, Kevin in particular; and Cagalli, knowing Kevin's past about as well as anyone did by that point, understood exactly why.

_He has a point there_, she admitted to herself. _If the original project had lasted long enough, I'm sure Zala would've deployed Kevin's people right after the Bloody Valentine; considering how things were back then, even the majority of the PLANTs' citizens would probably have gone along with it, if it meant taking out a lot of the Earth Forces. What with the attitude in the PLANTs after the nuclear attack that started _this_ war, I'm sure no one would've objected if Delta's people had been used offensively._

_Still…_

Cagalli slowly shook her head. "I'm sorry, Athrun," she said quietly, "but that's not all there is to it. Whoever it was that was actually behind it, those Destroyers and their backup _were_ with ZAFT. That shows that _someone_ high up in the PLANTs wants Kevin and Lacus dead; even without Durandal having the motive to do it, there's just too much evidence of ZAFT involvement. If we do anything to coordinate our efforts with ZAFT, we're taking a big risk."

Athrun opened his mouth, then closed it again, frustrated. The worst part of it was that he couldn't really disagree with her analysis. He still didn't believe that Durandal was personally involved -for all that the man had played a role in the ABADDON project, he seemed genuinely sincere in his current efforts, and had far too much to lose if such an operation went wrong- but he couldn't deny that danger still existed.

_Kevin's got so many enemies you need a scorecard to keep track,_ he thought unhappily, _and the _Archangel_ isn't much better off. They got away with sending _Dominion_ to help us out, but they've practically got a death warrant out for them by now…_

"All right," he said finally. "I can see why you don't want to coordinate directly with ZAFT; I don't like it, but all things considered you're probably right. Still… Why couldn't you go back to Orb, restore things there? With the firepower you have, and the loyalty most of the Orb military holds for the two of you…"

"It's not that easy, Athrun," Kira replied, shaking his head. "Whatever happened, we'd almost certainly have to fight our way through at least some of the Orb forces, and if we did that, it'd be too easy for the Earth Forces to just take outright control while Orb's defenses were still recovering. Also, we recently learned that-"

"Wait one," Kevin interrupted abruptly, voice taking on the snap of command that had surfaced only occasionally in the years since ABADDON. His jade eyes had narrowed behind his shades, and he cocked his head to one side, as though listening to something.

His companions looked at him curiously. While it was true that Kevin tended to be more attuned to his surroundings than they were -ground combat was more his specialty than theirs, particularly Kira and Athrun- it seemed unlikely that there'd be anything to warrant his sudden concern in the place they were now. Athrun had chosen the location for their meeting carefully, believing no one else was likely to find and interrupt it.

_Probably just an unexpected bird,_ Kira reasoned_. Or maybe a sensor ghost. Kevin's half-paranoid these days anyway-_

The holster built into his armor's right thigh piece popped open, and Kevin smoothly drew the Colt Single Action Army concealed there. Continuing the motion with fluid grace, he swept the revolver up to eye level at arm's length, pivoted to his left, and pulled the trigger.

With a loud bark, the weapon spat a forty-five caliber bullet up toward a rock outcropping a hundred meters away… and slammed headlong into the reception dish of the listening device Lunamaria Hawke was using to eavesdrop on the conversation below.

The dish shattered into a thousand pieces, and Luna recoiled in surprise fully as great as when she'd heard the startling reference to the "fake Lacus". _How did he-?_

"I don't know who you are," Kevin called, using his augmentation to amplify his voice, "and frankly, I don't really care. But you should know that that kind of gear shows up like a neon sign on my sensors… and that I don't like being spied on."

* * *

Shinn Asuka walked slowly, almost painfully, back toward the entrance to the ruined laboratory, now much less affected by the creepy scenery than when he'd entered.

Both his slow speed and effective immunity to the ghosts of the Lodonia lab were due to his companion, for he had one arm slung awkwardly around Rey Za Burrel's shoulders, helping the gasping, obviously agonized pilot out of the building.

_I hope Carter's call got the ship moving,_ Shinn thought, _and in a real hurry._ _Rey… what happened to you in there? I've never seen you react to _anything_ like this before. It's too extreme to be any kind of panic attack, even if that made any sense if the first place… it's almost like a heart attack, but that doesn't make any sense either…_

Well, he decided, as they neared the entrance foyer, he'd just better hope _Minerva_ arrived quickly. He hated to interrupt their repairs this way, but if Rey didn't get help soon… He wasn't sure what would happen then, but he was pretty sure it wouldn't be good.

Behind the pair, the two soldiers who had remained behind in the facility had almost forgotten them already; Rey's condition was something of a concern, since _Dominion_ was currently operating in cooperation with ZAFT, but the two of them had more pressing concerns on their minds just then.

Still in tiger-form, the assassin Invictus prowled around the laboratory chamber, reaching out with his various mechanical senses and sniffing intently with his tiger-like nose. "**I was wrong**," he rumbled, stepping toward a side door. "**There _is_ another similarity to the ABADDON lab after all. It's not obvious from the entrance, but…**"

Jack Carter nodded, prodding at a cabinet with the barrel of his pistol. "You smell it too, eh? Lubricants and traces of heavy metals… including battle steel, if I'm not mistaken." He glanced at his clone brother, concern overriding any lingering trace of resentment toward his fellow. "You thinking what I'm thinking?"

Invictus' fur rippled uneasily, answering the question as well as any verbal signal might have, and with a clap of his hands he reverted back to his normal shape. "Yeah, Jack, I think I'm thinking _exactly_ what you're thinking. Solkin syn… I was afraid of this."

Turning away, he pushed open the door he'd been edging toward before, disappearing through it into darkness, while Carter reached toward the cabinet he was poking at. _Now or never,_ the clone reasoned. _Besides, even if it's booby-trapped, what are the odds they ever figured on our kind getting here._ He grasped the cabinet's door handle, then hesitated. _On second thought, maybe they _did_ expect it, all things considered…_

Carter hesitated a moment longer, then shrugged. _Ah, to hell with it. If they did, they did; if they didn't, this might be important… and considering the chaos this place looks to have been in, they might not have had time._

Having reached his decision, he pulled open the cabinet.

What he saw within took a moment to truly register; when it did, however, Carter let out a truly vile Russian obscenity… at the same moment a similar expletive -this one in English- erupted from the room into which Invictus had disappeared.

Not looking up from the cabinet, Carter called, "Invictus… I can guess the sort of thing you just found, but I think you should take a look at this."

"Neg," Invictus replied succinctly, a dark shadow in his voice. "You need to see this, Jack. It's very important. More important than anything you'll find in something as small as a cabinet, I think."

Feeling something akin to dread forming in his gut, Carter turned away from the cabinet, and was across the room to the side door in three quick, long strides. _I don't like this,_ he thought uneasily. _Onishi's band and the Phase IIs are bad enough as it is. If he's found what I think he's found…_

He opened the door, walking quickly to Invictus' side… and swore even more vilely than before at the sight that greeted him.

The cabinet had contained what was recognizable as a Mod-3 cortical central processing unit; relatively low-tech compared to what Carter was used to, but perfectly serviceable for most things. Still, it could've just been leftovers from the original biological CPU experiments. He knew Sabnak, Andras, and Buer had made use of some cybernetics themselves.

The grisly sight here, however, was quite another matter entirely.

How long the unfortunate fellow had been dead was unclear; too much tissue had been shredded. Nor did it matter, all things considered, for what lay beneath the mangled flesh was far more important. Large portions of both breastbone and skull had been revealed by the explosion that tore up the room and presumably killed the man.

And instead of the stark white of ordinary bone, both chest and skull gleamed silver… an effect which both super-soldiers recognized, having seen it on themselves when wounded sufficiently.

The corpse had begun life as a human… but it had been modified in a process Carter and Invictus both knew all too well, which meant the day even Carter had secretly feared was at hand.

The Earth Alliance had begun experimenting with true Destroyers themselves.

* * *

Luna, though semi-paralyzed with surprise, had the presence of mind to duck back down below the outcropping before she could be identified; it would now be obvious to Athrun that someone was following him around, but she could at least minimize the damage.

_But how did he _do_ that?_ she wondered, shaken. _My amplification gear is all passive; even with his sensors, he shouldn't have been able… Oh. Passive, yeah, but still electronic; he must've picked up on the electromagnetic signature… no wonder it's hard to sneak up on the bastard._

"Free piece of advice, comrade," Kevin called, raising his revolver off-target. "Get out of here. I don't like eavesdroppers, and without that dish I don't think you'll be doing much listening in anyway. And…" His jade eyes turned cold. "This isn't your business, so buzz off."

Only Kevin Walker, Luna reflected, would say something like that when confronting an unknown spy, one who could well be equipped to blast him into dust bunnies. _That guy really _doesn't_ fear death_, she thought, shaking her head. _Easy to see why Shinn hates him so much…_

Nonetheless, she shut down her remaining gear, and began to slink away… carefully. She had no intention of leaving completely -she could still at least _watch_, presuming she found a new vantage point- but there was no sense in being obvious about it.

For his part, as soon as the energy signatures vanished, Kevin raised the Colt, blew the black powder smoke from its barreled, and returned it smoothly to its holster with a quick twirl. "Now then," he said, pulling a cigarette from a waist compartment and sticking it between his teeth, "where were we?"

Cagalli glanced at him quizzically. "You're not going after them?"

He shrugged. "Nah. If they're smart, they'll be gone by now; and if not, let 'em watch. It won't tell them anything new."

Kira and Athrun exchanged a resigned look. Fond though they were of their mutual friend, even after thirteen years they still found some of his tendencies… wearying. Like being so blasé about the possibility of a hostile being so close by.

_No point worrying about it, though,_ Athrun mused_. If the spy were really interested in attacking, he or she probably would've done it by now…_

"So," he said aloud, "what was this thing you've 'recently learned'? If it's serious enough to hamper a return to Orb…"

"Onishi's back," Cagalli told him soberly. "Not long before the Orb task force set out for the Dardanelles, Baron Onishi returned to Orb, and reclaimed his place in the government… at least, we think that's what he's doing."

Athrun blinked. "Onishi… but what's he trying to do? If he's back in the government, why is he still letting Orb participate in Earth Alliance operations? Considering that Blue Cosmos killed his wife, I thought he'd hate the Earth Forces."

Kevin snorted. "I don't even pretend to understand how Dad thinks these days, Athrun. True, he seems to have placed a lot of that hate on me, for having 'provoked' the sabotage in the first place, but still… Well, whatever the reason, you can be sure that his current actions suit his ultimate goals. Dad is one of the most devious people alive, and his schemes usually pan out."

His friend nodded unhappily. He'd never met Baron John Tyler Onishi -a fact for which he counted himself fortunate- but he knew the man's reputation. The original driving force behind Orb's mobile suit development, it was his hand that orchestrated the construction of Morgenröte's mobile suit production facilities at Heliopolis, for the development of MBF-M1000 Sturm Falke. Though the Sahaku family had later taken control, the original project had been a success… even if no one realized it at the time.

_That guy… whatever he's up to, it could threaten both Earth and the PLANTs, in ways we haven't even thought of yet; Kevin was part of something that took decades to reach its conclusion… _if_ it has. Still…_

"I would've thought you could take out two birds with one stone," Athrun said slowly. "Retake Orb _and_ stop Onishi's plans. Or is there something else going on?"

"Avalon Base," Kira supplied. "The Onishi family stronghold. _Archangel_ got most of the top-of-the-line equipment out, but there's still enough there that any attack against him with our resources would be a disaster." He shook his head. "I'm sorry, Athrun, but this really is the only way open to us now." He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again and met Athrun's gaze. "Athrun… are you going to fight against Orb again?"

Athrun looked away. "…I don't want to," he said quietly. "Believe me, fighting Orb is the last thing I want to do. But… look, you know how it is. If Orb forces attack us, we can't just sit there and let them, and we can't rely on the _Archangel_ to do all the fighting, either. You won't always be there, you can't take care of _everything…_ and whether you like it or not, you _do_ cause enough confusion that we can't rely on your assistance."

"We know, Athrun," Kira told him, and meant it. For all that he hated the extremes war forced people into, for all that he and his companions wanted to minimize Orb casualties, he understood Athrun's point. _Archangel_ was only one ship, with only a few mobile suits, and they could not follow Minerva everywhere… and even if they did, Orb forces would undoubtedly be engaging ZAFT in other theaters.

All they could do was minimize the conflicts where they could, and try to find a way to restore Orb's legitimate government; only in that could they end it. So far, though, they hadn't had much success in that regard, and until they did…

"We understand what you have to do, Athrun," Cagalli said quietly, unconsciously leaning against Kevin's solid, reassuring frame. "We don't expect you to just sit back and let yourselves be shot… but at the same time, can you understand _our_ point? We… we don't want Orb soldiers to be killed just because of that _bastard_ Seiran's treason!"

Athrun sighed. "Yeah," he admitted. "I understand. Like I said, I don't want to fight Orb, either; they're innocent pawns, and I fought alongside some of those guys toward the end of the last war. I… Look," he said, meeting her gaze, "I'll do what I can. I'll try not to destroy Orb units if I can avoid it, and I'll see what I can do about getting my people to do the same. I can't make any promises about Shinn, of course-"

This remark prompted a snort from Kevin; having already engaged the Impulse in battle more than once, he was completely unimpressed. _If he gets too far out of line, I blast Impulse to dust bunnies,_ he mused. _Nice and simple._

"-but about the others… I might be able to do something," Athrun went on. "Luna's not exactly happy with me these days, and I don't have any idea _what_ to make of Rey, but they'll follow orders. And Heine should be easy enough to convince; he doesn't like what you guys did at the Dardanelles, but he's actually got a pretty good opinion of you otherwise."

For perhaps the first time since they'd arrived, Kira smiled. "Thank you, Athrun," he said sincerely. "That's about the most we could ask. We'll keep trying to stop things from our end, too; maybe if we work together, we can find a way to get Orb out of the fighting entirely."

"Maybe we can," Athrun agreed, relaxing visibly. "I hope so. This entire war… it's gone too far already, and it looks like it's only going to get worse." He paused. "And… Kevin?"

The super-soldier raised an eyebrow. "Da?"

"I'm going to look into the Phase-II project," the blue-haired pilot told him. "I don't like it any better than you do; even if Lacus hadn't gotten hurt, I remember what Father said about the Phase-I project all too well. If there's anything rotten going on there, I'll find it… and put a stop to it."

Cagalli's eyes widened, and Kevin took on a very concerned expression. "…I appreciate that, Athrun, but do you realize what you're getting into?" There was a clear note of warning -and concern- in both his voice and eyes. "Natalya Ivanova is a very cold-blooded individual; she wouldn't hesitate to eliminate you if you meddled with whatever her agenda is. And… battling with Destroyers isn't a task even _I_ take on lightly. For a Coordinator to make the attempt…"

To his surprise, Athrun actually smiled. "You worry too much, Kevin," he said, shaking his head. "In the first place, Arkanian isn't stupid; I think she knows that attacking me would send you on a rampage. And the second…" His smile turned wry. "Kevin, the way you said it yourself shows the advantage I have: you referred to me as a Coordinator, as though you aren't one yourself."

Kevin blinked, taken aback. "Well, that's because-"

"Because you're not human anymore?" Athrun interrupted, and shook his head again. "Kevin, whether or not that's true, you're still showing the problem other Destroyers are likely to have. Since I'm _not_ one of them, they'll just assume I can't hurt them… which wouldn't be very smart of them." His emerald eyes gleamed. "One thing I've learned over the last couple years, Kevin, is that Destroyers _do_ have weaknesses… and I have some idea of how to exploit them, especially if the Phase-IIs really are weaker than you are."

Kira watched Kevin's expression carefully after that remark, noting with interest his friend's perceptible -to him- inner uncertainty. Over the years since Kevin had returned from his semi-exile, his attitude had shown, however subtly, that he believed himself to be beyond merely human, in terms of his physical ability; and while that was true, it seemed to go further than that, like a silent assumption that no "mere human" could _ever_ compete with the fruits of Abaddon.

The fact was, though, that Cagalli had injured Mike Carnehan shortly before his death, and the Coordinator assassins sent to the Onishi Mansion had managed to keep Kevin on his toes, however briefly. And if anyone had both the knowledge and ability to face a Destroyer with "merely human" strength, it was Athrun Zala.

_The only question is,_ Kira thought, _whether or not Kevin can accept that. He really does think of himself as being overwhelmingly superior to humanity… and he's always so worried about losing people…_

After a long, silent moment of inner struggle, Kevin slowly nodded. "…Maybe you're right," he mused, almost as though speaking to himself alone. "Even now, we consider ourselves a breed apart… but maybe that arrogance could also be our downfall, if faced by the right -or wrong- opponent."

Leaving Cagalli's side, he stepped up to Athrun, tapped his left thigh, and pulled a pistol out of the compartment that popped open. Twirling it around his armored left index finger for a moment, he spun it completely around, caught it by the barrel, and extended its grip toward Athrun.

"Take it," Kevin told him. "Might come in handy."

Hesitantly, the other pilot accepted the weapon. "Antique," he noted, looking it over. "Forty-five caliber?"

Kevin nodded. "Antique it may be, but serviceable. Colt M1911, modified with a long slide, custom rubber grips, tritium sights, and top of the line trigger and hammer assemblies. The ammunition is a mixture, copper-jacketed explosive hollow points alternating with 'Talon-style' bullets, with copper jackets meant to peel away into eight prongs, for maximum damage potential. You'll want to use the explosive rounds on Destroyers; I don't think Phase-II has AKWES, so it should work reasonably well."

"…Thanks, Kevin." Athrun clapped the super-soldier on the shoulder. "I hope I won't need this, but if I do… thanks." He looked over at Kira and Cagalli. "Look… I'd better go. _Minerva_ won't be going anywhere for a couple of weeks yet,, but there are a few people aboard who might start to wonder if I'm gone too long."

Cagalli nodded. "I understand, Athrun. But you take care of yourself, you hear me? You nearly got yourself killed _way_ too many times in the last war; we won't forgive you if you do something stupid and get fried."

Athrun smiled. "Don't worry. I learned my lesson back then… back on that day." He didn't need to elaborate; they all remembered his near-disastrous meeting with his father, before Mendel. "I'll be coming back… whenever it is that we can finally meet again."

Turning away, he began walking toward the Savior… but Kira's voice gave him pause. "Athrun… will we have to fight you?"

He froze, tensing for a moment, then relaxed. "No," he said firmly. "No matter what happens… I'm not repeating the mistakes we made three years ago. Whatever happens from here on, we're not enemies. Not now… and not _ever_ again." He turned to face them again, a wistful look on his face. "Just like at Copernicus… we're friends. Always."

* * *

_I wonder what Athrun's doing now,_ Meyrin Hawke thought, leaning back in her Bridge chair. _He… probably went off to meet with Walker and those others, I guess; but what about? And it's been over a day now…_

She assumed he wasn't in any danger, at least not from the _Archangel_'s people; it was, after all, quite well known that Athrun Zala had fought alongside the ship in the latter stages of the previous war, and was close friends with several of them. The chances of the likes of the Freedom pilot attacking him were effectively nil.

On the other hand, Meyrin knew a few things about the situation that her crewmates did not… such as the nature of the marauding Leviathan and its pilot. She hadn't heard the full story, but Athrun had given her a few of the highlights when Luna wasn't around, so she knew there was a chance of something going very wrong, should Michael Carnehan choose to hunt down Kevin Walker during the meeting.

_Guess I shouldn't borrow trouble,_ _though,_ Meyrin mused with a sigh. _Athrun's a good pilot; even if something _does_ happen, he'll be able to get away… or defeat it. I might as well just relax for now; besides, it's not as if _Minerva_ will be going somewhere anytime soon, so…_

Relaxing even further, she allowed her eyes to close for a moment, enjoying the chance to rest. After spending so much time coordinating supply transfers and work parties, she was dead tired. The last time she'd been this exhausted was when _Minerva_ was chasing Bogey One, and thence to the site of Break The World.

_I guess this is how war is,_ she thought, stifling a yawn. _Moments of pure terror mixed in with hours of grueling work and days of absolute bore-_

A beeping sound interrupted her idle musing, and Meyrin snapped upright as the code registered. Leaning forward, her fingers made contact with her keyboard and tapped in a quick acceptance sequence. The signal was quantum in nature, which almost certainly meant-

"Signal from the Lodonia team, Captain!" Meyrin called over her shoulder. "From Carter's quantum link!"

Talia Gladys, heretofore taking an unobtrusive breather of her own, straightened quickly. "Put it on, Meyrin," she ordered, inwardly wondering what was so urgent; Jack Carter was such an independent sort she wouldn't have expected to hear from him -or even the assassin Invictus- until they'd returned to the ship.

Meyrin wasted no time complying, having already begun doing just that, and Carter's voice came over the Bridge speakers a moment later. _"Jack Carter here,"_ he said flatly. _"Captain Gladys, we've got a situation here: Za Burrel just had some kind of fit and collapsed; dunno what's going on, but I think he needs medical attention, ASAP."_

Talia's gaze snapped to Malik Yardbirds, just starting to rouse from his own semi-torpor; considering his position as helmsman, he'd had no more reason to expect any duties just then than anyone else. "Malik," she snapped, "check with Aves and Alexander, find out if we're at all flight-capable yet. If so, prepare for immediate takeoff."

"Right away, Captain," Yardbirds replied crisply, sudden adrenaline charge providing the energy to wake him up completely. "Engine Room, this the Bridge. I need to know if we can take off…"

Ignoring both the burst of semi-obscene complaining over the intercom and Malik's wince, Talia turned her attention back to the radio link. "What's Rey's condition, Carter? What happened?"

"_Haven't the foggiest idea,"_ Carter replied, his tone implying a shrug. _"We reached one of the interior rooms -pretty ghastly, by the way; you'll see what I mean when you get here- and the kid just started hyperventilating, muttering to himself, and clutching his chest. If I didn't know better, I'd say he was having a heart attack, but it doesn't make any damn sense… Look, Shinn's with him, but he needs professional assistance as soon as possible."_

She nodded grimly. "Understood. Please contact me if anything else happens; in the meantime, we'll be on our way shortly."

"_Affirm, Captain.. Carter out."_

Gingerly replacing the earpiece he'd removed when Aves began shouting at him, Malik turned to look up at the captain. "We're, ah, ready to go, Ma'am," he said with another wince. "Aves isn't happy about it, but we can move… as long as we don't have to pull any combat maneuvers, anyway. If we do, he says we'll explode."

_Typical mechanic,_ Talia thought, with a mental shake of her head. "Can't be helped; we need to bring the doctor to Rey. Launch _Minerva,_ and head for the Lodonia lab at best available speed."

"Roger."

* * *

"Solkin syn," Kevin breathed, watching as Savior rose smoothly into the air, folded into mobile armor mode, and turned back toward the mainland. "You think he'll be okay?"

Kira sighed. "I don't know," he admitted, gazing after the red machine until it shrank to a speck. "I think he can handle himself… but I'm still not happy that he's gone back to ZAFT like that. After everything that's happened…"

The two exchanged a look, and Cagalli knew what they were thinking about. She'd only been present for one of the… unpleasant encounters between the three friends during the first war, when Kevin nearly killed Athrun on an island in the Indian Ocean, but she remembered well the angst that had surrounded all three of them during that time.

Time and again, they'd met each other on the field of battle, with Kira nearly suffering a mental breakdown from the stress, and Kevin actually vowing to _kill_ Athrun… with everything culminating in a terrible encounter in the Marshall Islands. That battle had been a pure grudge match, fueled by the death of Nicol Amalfi and the apparent demise of Tolle Koenig; it was something of a mystery that _any_ of them had survived that day.

It was no mystery at all, however, why none of them wanted to repeat it.

"I'm sure it won't come to that this time," Cagalli told them, gripping their shoulders and gently tugging them back. "It's not like back then; whatever may be going on inside ZAFT, you know you're all on the same page this time. Well, mostly," she amended, taking into account Athrun's disagreement with their methods. "Anyway, you _know_ this isn't going to result in some kind of battle like last time… so cheer up, okay?"

"…Yeah," Kira agreed, allowing Cagalli to guide him back toward the mobile suits. "Yeah, you're right. If it came down to that again, there's no way Athrun would side with ZAFT over us; we all learned our lesson from that battle." He glanced at Kevin. "Right… tovarisch?"

Kevin smiled, though his eyes were curiously shadowed. "Yeah, you're right. It'd be like old times… like when we planted that bottle rocket in Kyle's locker."

Kira laughed, remembering the chaos the incident had caused. "I haven't thought about that in years! Blew up the entire row of lockers, didn't it? All that hairspray…"

Cagalli burst out laughing, losing her grip on their shoulders. "You… you blew up someone's locker? Why? And why was there hairspray…?"

"Kyle Vosper," Kira explained, his chuckling now as much from Cagalli's amusement as his own recollections. "He was the leader of the bullies Kevin beat up when we were kids; he didn't remember it afterwards, of course, but we still, uh… Well, we didn't exactly pass up opportunities to get back at him even after that. And he was kind of narcissistic, so…"

"We got caught," Kevin remembered, vividly recalling the interesting shade of puce their principle had turned afterwards. "Nearly got us suspended, actually, especially since this was after the ferret incident, but Kyle caught some of the flack, too -something about a fire hazard in his locker- so the principle had the three of us do the cleanup, and that was that."

"Kyle turned over a new leaf after that, though," Kira remembered. "Stopped bullying… and then planted some kind of really disgusting chemical mix in _Kevin's_ locker, connected to a firecracker."

"Opened the locker, and _boom,"_ the super-soldier affirmed with a grimace. "Kyle was smart: not much of a blast… but he'd noticed that I had a very acute sense of smell. That ammonia-garlic mix put me out like a light."

Cagalli shook her head, still chuckling. Kevin she could easily imagine behaving in such a way; they'd known each other all their lives, after all, and she remembered his near-constant rivalry with one Yuna Roma Seiran. Kira, on the other hand… She'd only gotten to know him after the _Archangel_ arrived in Libya, and so had never seen how he'd been as a child. The idea of him -or Athrun, for that matter- indulging in pranks was both hilarious and difficult to comprehend.

_Before the war, I guess,_ she mused. _Everything was different back then. Kevin's father had already started scheming, but none of us knew that back then; we were all just kids in those years…_

"Those were some good times," Kira said thoughtfully. "Kind of scary, especially when our pranks went bad, but good times… before tensions escalated, and everything started going wrong."

"Tell me about it," Kevin said fervently, recalling his mother's death… and his own subsequent abduction and enhancement into a cybernetic killing machine. "Well… maybe we'll see days like that again, after all this is over." His gaze turned to the sky, still discolored from the damage of Break The World. "If we can just choose the right future…"

Cagalli glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. "You know, Kevin," she said slowly, "there's something I've been meaning to ask you."

He raised an eyebrow. "Eh?"

"Well, your talk about the future reminded me about something." She hesitated. "You've said, since we left Orb, that you stopped using ZERO because of something that happened between the wars… but you've never said _what,_ and I can't get Murrue or anyone else to tell me, either."

Kevin's step faltered for an instant, most of his body freezing in the manner Murrue Ramius had long ago noted was his typical reaction to being startled. Behind his bright jades eyes, images of destruction flashed past, of a dark shape blazing through space, titanic azure bursts, tremendous explosions… and a frightful, jade-eyed visage…

"…I saw a future I didn't want," he said at length, voice almost inaudible. "A terrible future… I saw my dark half…"

"Your dark half…?" Cagalli stopped, turning to face her boyfriend. "Kevin, what did you-"

A streak of azure light flashed overhead, close enough for the trio to feel the heat of its passage.

Kevin and Cagalli threw themselves flat, dragging Kira down with them, just as the black shape flew by mere meters over their heads. "Solkin syn!" Kevin burst out, rolling over to search the sky. "It's Leviathan!"

"_I knew I'd find you soon, Hydra!"_ a voice shouted, projected from external speakers on the attacking mobile suit. _"The stage is set, and the game is on!"_

Pulling up into a steep climb, ZGMF-X15A/M Leviathan looped around, leveled off, and transformed smoothly into mobile suit mode. Hovering there on the backwash of thrusters fueled by matter/antimatter annihilation, Michael Carnehan's machine gazed down at the three with its bright jade eyes… and its twin buster rifle was pointed loosely in their direction.

Loosely, in this case, meaning that a shot anywhere near would still fry them.

"Nichevo!" Kevin exploded. "Kira, get Cagalli to the Freedom, and hurry!" Scrambling to his feet, he leapt into a mad dash for the cliff edge, moving at a speed Kira couldn't match, trusting his armor and augmented body to get him safely through the coming fall.

"Wait!" Cagalli shouted after him. "I'm going with you!" She climbed to her feet, starting to run after him… but Kira pulled her back.

"He'll fight better by himself," he said urgently, tugging her away toward Freedom.

"He has a higher G-tolerance than either of us, remember? Nemesis might knock you out!" Ignoring her protests, he scooped her up into his arms, charging toward Freedom… wondering distantly why Leviathan hadn't already fried them all.

He got his answer a moment later in the form of a laugh from the hovering mobile suit. _"Good!"_ the Kraken called out. _"This would all be meaningless if you didn't even have a chance to fight back! The future I've chosen… needs a grander battle than that!"_

"Crazy bastard," Kevin muttered to himself, and launched himself into a flying leap for Nemesis' hatch. Landing hard on its lower half, he lunged for the pilot's seat, simultaneously bringing up his radio implant. Ordinarily, he could trust _Archangel_ to have noticed the threat already… but Leviathan was made from the same material as Nemesis, and thus invisible to radar. _"Archangel,_ we have a problem!"

Instantly, Murrue's voice resonated in his mastoid. _"What is it, Kevin? Leviathan?"_

"No doubt about it, Murrue," Kira answered, before Kevin could; he'd gotten into Freedom's cockpit, with Cagalli clinging to the side of his seat, and patched into the quantum radio signal. "It's Carnehan, all right… and I think he's here to finish it."

Murrue swore audibly; not normally given to such a reaction, she knew all too well the power of Gundanium machines… especially in the hands of those as indiscriminate as Carnehan. _"Can you escape?"_

"Negative," he replied tightly. "He can outrun us; last time he only retreated because of damage."

"_I'm on my way,"_ Leona Colde cut in. _"Kira, Reaper, hold out until I arrive. We can take him together; last time we were able to force him off, and we've got a better idea of what we're facing this time."_ Her voice was as cold as her name. _"I'll give him a taste of my fury… you can count on it."_

"Better hurry," Kevin told her grimly, bringing Nemesis' systems to life. "This guy is not one to be taken lightly, remember." His expression tightened. "Either way, though, it ends tonight." His cybernetic hand clenched. "One way or another… I'll finish it once and for all."

There was silence on the other end of the link for a long moment, and then Murrue spoke up again, very softly. _"Are you sure you can do this, Kevin? Whatever he may be now, you know what he used to be… and you don't have to do this. Kira and Leona have a better chance against Leviathan anyway."_ She hesitated_. "And what if you get _yourself_ killed doing it?"_

Kevin was silent for several moments himself. He understood her concerns all too well; he'd been with her when Mu died, and understood quite well how strongly she felt for those close to her… just as he knew what his own death would do to her, Cagalli, and a number of other people.

And he also understood, all too well, her concern about _who_ he was facing.

"…I don't know if I can do it or not," he admitted quietly. "I killed him once, in Banadiya, but he'd directly threatened Cagalli then… and I was still uncertain of my own feelings about the Abaddon. But… I don't have much of a choice. If he survives Leviathan's fall, I'm the only one who can stop him on foot, Murrue. You _know_ that."

For one brief moment, Kevin thought she was going to order him to depart anyway; and though he recognized the authority of very few, he _would_ have obeyed the order, much as he would had it come from Cagalli… but then a resigned, tense sigh came over the airwaves.

"…_I still don't like it,"_ Murrue said quietly, _"but I see your point. But,"_ she added strongly, _"you'd better come back alive! You hear me, Kevin? If you die again, I'll put you in the brig for the next six months!"_

Kevin surprised them both by laughing lightly; though after all, Murrue was partly serious, considering his history. "Da, tovarisch. No getting killed today. I may even be home by midnight."

"_See that you are,"_ Murrue instructed_. "Kira, you take care of the idiot, understood? And Cagalli, I expect you to take action if he does anything insane!"_

"I'll do my best, Murrue," Kira promised, as Freedom began to rise into the air.

"So will I," Cagalli agreed. "If he _does_ do anything crazy…"

Kevin winced; as Cagalli Yula Athha was the one person in the entire world whom he would unquestioningly obey, she was entirely capable of giving him a _lot_ of grief if he did anything "crazy".

"_All right, then."_ Murrue sighed again. _"I'll have _Archangel_ heading your way soon; if this goes on too long, we'll see how Carnehan handles direct fire-support. And until then… Godspeed to you all."_

The link closed, leaving only silence.

Now fully activated, Freedom and Nemesis climbed rapidly into the air, both pilots already prepared to lunge into motion at any moment… and Leviathan hovered above, like some kind of demonic bird.

Seeing the two lift off at last, Michael Carnehan grinned. _Here it comes,_ he thought, elated. _The beginning of the end… the final act of this insane play. When this ends, so will everything else._

_(Indeed, Kraken,)_ the other voice within Leviathan noted, anticipation evident in the silent tone. _(The time has come to burn brightly, to leave our mark upon the world… and to finally bring your part to its conclusion. Win or lose, we shall both see satisfaction.)_

_Exactly right, compadre._ Carnehan's grin widened. "Glad you could make it, Hydra," he called mockingly. "And you brought one of your friends from last time… well, that's okay. Everything ends here, Kevin! This whole sad business, my cursed existence… and your treason will all be expunged from this world with one last clash!"

Raising Leviathan's twin buster rifle to the sky, he separated it into two, each hand filling with one of the powerful weapons. "Have at you, Hydra! Choose the future that you desire… and fight for it!"

* * *

Bending down over the metal-covered corpse, Invictus grimaced. "Poor bastard," he muttered, examining the body even as Carter hacked into a nearby computer terminal. "I wonder what they did to you, before you got blown up?" Reaching out with gloved hands, he took hold of the skeleton's skull, applied carefully metered pressure, and yanked it right off.

"You're disgusting," Carter said over his shoulder, fingers flying over the keys. "D'you have to be that morbid, Invictus?"

"It's not easy to check for implants when it's still attached," the assassin replied calmly, and rested the skull in the palm of his left hand. "Alas, poor Yorik… I knew him well."

"Doubt it," Carter told him. "Unless you've been to Eurasia more than I think you have." When Invictus turned to him confusion, he pointed to the menu he'd just brought up, displaying a list of test subjects.

One name on the list read as "Yancey Orik".

"Y. Orik," Invictus said in disbelief. "Ugh." Baffled -and now mildly creeped out himself- he set the skull aside. "Well, however bizarre the coincidence, the fact remains that he was some kind of Destroyer imitation. A bit crude compared to you or me, but serviceable; I found a comm. implant in what was left of his right mastoid process, his skeleton's been atomically bonded with titanium, and I noticed something on his hands that looks to be derived from Kevin's shape-memory claws."

Carter let out a noise of disgust, and then turned back to his hacking. _We knew this was inevitable, _he thought grimly. _They obviously didn't have access to any original material -unless, I suppose, they realized what Carnehan was, and studied him when he was working for CARDINAL- but Walker is a bit too high-profile these days. It was only a matter of time before some genius on the Earth Alliance side of things started working out how Destroyers functioned…_

Clearly their understanding was less than perfect; the use of titanium instead of battle steel indicated they were still feeling their way into the skeletal reinforcement techniques, and the CPU Carter had found earlier was more primitive than what he himself was equipped with… but they were undoubtedly learning, and "crude" did not mean harmless.

Not when dealing with augmented soldiers, at any rate. Even crude Destroyer analogues would be a force multiplier of considerable effect, whether on foot or in mobile suits. Enhanced reflexes and high G-tolerances were of great significance in mobile suit warfare.

"We'd better warn Captain Gladys about this when _Minerva_ arrives," Carter muttered, breaking through another layer of security. "I don't like ZAFT, but I _do_ like the PLANTs; the idea of them being hit with these things without any warning doesn't sit well with me at all."

"Agreed. And that reminds me… We'll need to report this to Natarle as soon as we get back. Kevin needs to hear about this." Invictus straightened, gazing down at the corpse with a mixture of pity and disgust. "Rotten bastards…"

A distant rumbling sound began to resonate through the walls of the wrecked lab, prompting Carter to pause in his hacking efforts. "Engines and levitators," he noted, listening intently. "Mobile assault ship-grade. I think _Minerva_'s here."

"Sounds like," the assassin agreed, and turned toward the door. "You keep trying to get the experimentation records; I'll go greet the reinforcements."

"Affirm."

Invictus stepped away from the corpse, turned, and departed from the room, even as Carter's keystrokes continued without pause. _Why can't anything ever be simple? _the assassin lamented inwardly, making his way back through the corridors. _We've got at least four factions involved in this whole mess -ZAFT, the Earth Forces, us, and Father- and _three_ of them have Destroyer variants, while the fourth has a veritable army of _modifica extremis_ clones. Thank heavens we're not on fighting terms with ZAFT at the moment; having the Phase-II program on our case would make things even worse than they already are…_

* * *

Twin bolts of pure azure light split the skies, targeted effortlessly in two different directions, and the two mobile suits hurriedly flung themselves to either side.

"Vnyebrachnyi," Kevin hissed, and snapped up his own twin buster rifle. A crosshair appearing in his mental vision, he guided it on-target in the blink of an eye, focusing on Leviathan's head… and squeezed the trigger.

With the buster rifle still in duel-fire mode, the resulting blast was more powerful than either of the shots Leviathan had unleashed, and over twice as large, despite the difference in weapon power. Scorching across the sky with sufficient energy to tear through almost any armor known to man, a hit of any kind would've resulted in instant victory.

But Kevin was denied that hit.

Converting to mobile armor mode faster and more smoothly than even its designer thought possible, Leviathan was in motion even as the shot was fired, and its powerful thrusters shoved it into a steep dive a split second before the high-energy burst could pulverize it.

"Nice shot, Hydra," Carnehan acknowledged, leveling off. "But you still don't understand what you're dealing with!" Feeding power into his thrusters, he launched Leviathan forward… and azure light leapt into existence on the leading edges of its wings. "I've mastered your great invention in ways you wouldn't have believed possible!"

Kira's eyes widened, realizing Kraken's intent. "Kevin, look out!" Even as he uttered the warning, he spun Freedom around, following Leviathan's flight path with viper-like speed of his own, and his fingers flew across his controls.

His own awareness heightened by the stimulants and synapse-boosting drugs he routinely used in battle, Kevin understood the danger himself almost instantly… but however fast his thought processes, no drug could enhance the speed of his mobile suit. All he could do was watch Leviathan as it closed, intent on slicing him in half with its beam-edged wings… and make a desperate attempt to bring his own rifle back on target in time to make a difference.

_Too slow, Hydra,_ Carnehan thought, smiling tightly. _Come on, come on, come on! If you would just understand what you're dealing with, we could have a _real-

At the instant before impact, a heavy, doubled thud emanated from Leviathan's tail. "What the hell?" With an exclamation and a strangled curse from the resurrected Destroyer, Leviathan's nose kicked skyward, the high-velocity impacts just forward of its engines having forcibly dropped its tail, and it shot wildly upward, missing Nemesis' head by less than two meters.

Two hundred meters away, Cagalli let out a sigh of pure relief. "Nice shooting, Kira," she breathed. "Very nice."

_(His reflexes are better than anticipated,)_ ZERO whispered. _(Now updating threat profile of Freedom and Kira Yamato.)_

Kira was no Destroyer… but he was about as close as any non-augmented human could come. Combining physical capabilities close to _modifica extremis_ with greater mental and emotional stability, there was a reason many acknowledged the Freedom's pilot as the best in the world. Especially when combined with the Freedom itself.

Having turned in place a fraction faster than Leviathan could fly in a straight line, Kira had targeted by eye and unleashed a pair of hyper-velocity slugs from his rail cannons at precisely the right moment to blast the stolen prototype off its deadly course.

Now Kira tracked his Lupus rifle across, snapping it into position while Leviathan was still fumbling in its attempts to regain control… and pulled the trigger the instant his reticule went red, spitting a bolt of pure emerald light across the sky.

Only to have it spatter into green sparks, shattered on contact with a bright, web-like hemisphere that coalesced into existence a meter out from Leviathan's tail.

"Nice one, Freedom," Carnehan taunted, forcibly wrenching his machine back under control. "But I've got the measure of you now, and you won't get me so easily next time!" Leviathan snapped upright, whirling in place to bring its buster rifle to bear-

And threw itself backwards as a three-meter burst of azure light nearly took its head off.

"Solkin syn," Kevin swore, frustrated. "I haven't missed this much since I fought Providence… just what the hell is going _on_ here?" Separating his rifles, he swept his wings back, poured energy into his thrusters, and charged, triggering bolts of synthetic lightning at his brother's machine as he came.

To his confusion and increasing frustration, Leviathan boosted to one side, spun completely around, and even performed a rapid backflip to evade the powerful fusion bolts. Instead of tearing the black machine apart, as they ought to have, they burned right on past, leaving ionized air behind them, and crashed into the ground, impacting with the force of a fair amount of old-fashioned TNT.

"You still don't get it, do you, Hydra?" Kraken's mouth twisted in a cruel smile. "You can't win by fighting me with only that level. Don't you understand? I foresaw this battle… just as I foresee every move you make!"

In Freedom's cockpit, Kira's eyes went wide, and Cagalli gasped, suddenly understanding the implications of both Carnehan's words and his startling ability to predict incoming fire. "It can't be!"

Within the cockpit of the Nemesis, Kevin's face paled and his own eyes went wide, their pupils shifting to slits in a partial, involuntary transformation, as shock mixed with more than a touch of horror exploded in his gut. "No," he breathed. "ZERO… What did you see?" he demanded. "What future did ZERO show you? _Answer me, damn you! What did you see, in that twisted mirror?"_

Kraken laughed, a sound of pure exhilaration… and glee. "I saw the end, Hydra! The end of this twisted existence… or this pointless battle… of our own abominable past! ZERO showed me the way… to end it all. To finally escape this prison of a half-life, and to finally exact revenge for our fallen comrades!" He grinned, no longer mocking, but rather the look of a man who knows his trials will soon be over. "And what about you, Kevin? What do _you_ see, when you look into ZERO? What future do _you_ choose?"

It went against everything he'd done over the past two years. It went against his own promise to himself not to do it again, against Murrue's fears… and against his own fear of what might happen to him if he did. But he did it anyway.

Kevin Walker's free hand reached out, darting for the red switch on his instrument panel. Flipping up its cover, he pressed it without hesitation…

And Nemesis' own ZERO System came fully alive for the first time since its initial activation, over a year previously.

* * *

Two kilometers from the battle area, appearing as a barely-visible distortion in the air, a sleek, lethal craft hovered, observing the conflict. Within its cramped cockpit, an armored figure lay, watching the duel through the strike fighter's sensors.

"Not good," the soldier known only as Hyperion muttered. "Mike is in that thing… and he's somehow gained full control over its capabilities." Hyperion cursed, eyes closing in pain not of the body. "Mike, please… stop this. You knew the truth once; you knew then why Kevin did what he did…"

The soldier cursed again. _It's my fault,_ Hyperion thought bitterly. _Mike saved me that day… and then wiped out his memories of it, braking his own mind in the process. If I hadn't taken this path, then maybe…_

The Excalibur fighter twitched in the air, slipping minutely from side to side, as conflicting impulses flashed through the armored soldier's mind. On the one hand, Hyperion wanted to intervene, to protect Kevin as before… but on the other, Hyperion was very, very reluctant to battle Mike Carnehan… the one responsible for bringing the soldier safely out of the ABADDON lab before it exploded.

In the end, Hyperion's decision would almost certainly have come out in Kevin's favor -the soldier's chosen duty was to protect him, after all- but one piece of information served to allow the soldier to escape the dilemma entirely… at least for now. Covertly accessing bio-data via the old Destroyer interlinks, Hyperion took one look at the two combatants' alpha waves, and instantly canceled any movement orders to the fighter.

The Excalibur was a phenomenal machine, capable of delivering and surviving a great deal of punishment… but Hyperion was not insane enough to risk taking it into the middle of a battle between two ZERO system-equipped mobile suits with buster-class weaponry.

_And so I'm granted a reprieve,_ Hyperion thought_. But still… it's _only_ a reprieve. If this ends the way I fear it might…_

The soldier's eyes closed again. If the battle failed to end with the duel between mobile suits, and carried on into a hand-to-hand engagement… then Hyperion would have to confront the decision again.

No matter how badly either outcome would hurt.

* * *

Several kilometers distant from the impromptu battlefield, the sea shifted, water starting to spray into the air, as something came up from below, plowing toward the surface was almost reckless speed. Reckless… yet undeniably graceful.

Almost everything about the mobile assault ship _Archangel_ was graceful, as befitted her majestic -if unorthodox- form.

The sleek, white ship burst free from the water's grip, arcing into the sky, all five fusion-powered thrusters pumping out energy at maximum military power. Unhampered by the water's resistance, the _Archangel_ would make much better time… though the tradeoff was a greater risk of detection by those who would wish her ill.

On her Bridge, Murrue Ramius gazed tautly out the forward viewport, entire body tense. "ETA to their location?" she asked tightly.

"At present speed, five minutes, Murrue," Miriallia Haw replied from CIC, her own voice grim. Having known Kira and Kevin for several years now, she was close to them both… and the time since Heliopolis fell had also brought her close to Cagalli, despite the other girl's noble birth. Losing any one of them…

_Be careful, guys,_ she thought, uttering a silent prayer for their safety. _We're coming. Just hold on a little longer… _Miriallia could tell from the telemetry -relayed from Nemesis' quantum communications gear- that both Nemesis and Freedom were still intact… but that was _all_ she could tell. Both of them were clearly too heavily engaged to make any reports.

Murrue nodded almost absently in response to the report. It was a relief to know they'd be arriving soon… but she was a highly experienced naval officer herself. She knew how long five minutes could be on the battlefield, especially in a mobile suit duel. Even with the skill of her friend and their mutual adopted brother, five minutes could well be too long in this situation.

_Leona will be there soon, too,_ she reminded herself, forcing some of her muscles to relax. _Her G-tolerance isn't as high as Kevin's, but Saber can still pull a much higher acceleration than we can. When it's three on one, even Leviathan should be hard-pressed to defeat them all._

"It'll be okay, Murrue," Andrew Waltfeld told her, swiveling in the copilot's seat to face her. "Remember, Racher's survived almost everything that's ever been thrown at him, and come back even from the things he didn't. And Kira… well, you know even better than I do how good he is. They'll make it."

Murrue took a deep breath. "Yes," she said quietly, shoulders relaxing a fraction. "Yes, you're right. Thank-"

A sharp inhalation from CIC interrupted her, as Mir's displays suddenly changed. On Nemesis' status display, a new indicator appeared… one of lurid red, displaying an advancing, jagged line, fluctuating in a pattern she found all too familiar. "Murrue, Kevin's alpha waves just changed! The pattern… he's fully activated ZERO!"

Every muscle that had managed to relax now tightened again, and Murrue breathed a curse she'd learned from Kevin. Unlike most, including Cagalli and Kira, she knew _exactly_ what Kevin had seen -and almost done- the one time he'd fully initiated the 2.0 version of ZERO. She knew why he refused to use it to its fullest extent, and preferred not to activate it at all.

If he had activated it now, that meant two things: that there was a possibility of the same "accident" happening again… and that Kevin believed he had no other chance of defeating his opponent.

"Arnold," she heard someone else say with her voice, "redline the engines. I want us in range of that battle _now."_

* * *

Synthetic lightning crackled across the sky, blasting out with booms resembling thunder, as a pair of twin buster rifles fired on one another in the twilight. Each bolt packed enough energy to turn most mobile suits into molten metal and free hydrogen in an instant… or turn the landscape below into something resembling the surface of the moon.

It was like a duel at ten paces with rocket launchers… especially considering the systems in use by both parties.

Kira cursed, snapping up Freedom's shield as one of Leviathan's azure bolts came all too close to vaporizing him. "This isn't good," he muttered to Cagalli. "He was bad enough last time; if he's got a ZERO system online in there…" The cockpit lit up with a bright blue glow, as the buster rifle shot expended its fury against the antibeam shield, but the tough defense held even against its might.

The instant the beam faded, Kira snapped up his Lupus rifle, triggering a bolt of coherent green light toward the madly-dancing enemy machine. Flashing across the sky, it would've pierced even Leviathan's Gundanium armor… had it connected.

At the same moment, Kevin had also sent an azure beam of his own toward Leviathan, and the two together should have given Carnehan a blinding headache -to say the least- but the zombie-like Destroyer was operating under different constraints from his opponents. With the tactical advantage ZERO gave him, he managed to anticipate the attacks, and spun in such a way that the twin beams were coming from either side.

At the instant of impact, Leviathan's forearms glowed, web-like shields of ethereal light flaring into existence. With a painfully bright flash, blue and green bolt alike spattered harmlessly against the immaterial defense.

A split second later, Carnehan dropped his shields, swung his buster rifle to point directly to his right, and fired a high-powered blast at Nemesis. Pumping more energy into it than Kevin had for his own shot, the Kraken's resulting shot was fully large enough to burn away Nemesis' entire body… and then some.

_But you're not the only one using ZERO now,_ Kevin thought, almost unnaturally calm.

Nemesis' thrusters flared, boosting it twenty meters straight up an instant before Leviathan actually fired. Mid-boost, its rifle came up again, and Kevin launched yet another azure streak across the sky.

Only to find, as he'd unfortunately expected, that Leviathan had already moved, having anticipated the exact timing and direction of the attack.

Kira swore again, more vehemently, and threw Freedom into a cartwheel to the left, letting the errant bolt scorch past, impacting on the water below with the force of a medium-sized bomb. _This is insane,_ he thought, briefly reaching back to help steady Cagalli after the violent maneuver. _One pilot doing that is bad enough; when_ both _combatants can tell what the other is about to do, it's total chaos!_ "What's the point in this battle, anyway?" he demanded, snapping into HiMAT configuration. "Carnehan! Why are you doing this?"

"You could never understand, Yamato," Kraken sneered, stowing his rifle. "You and your pampered life… you could never understand what the Destroyers experienced! You don't know how hard our training was… or how horrifying the Project's end was, when Hydra tried to blow us all to hell! You can't understand the betrayal we suffered that day… or the twisted bond I will end tonight!"

"You're wrong," Kira replied, eyes flashing angrily. "I know Kevin better than you _ever_ could! I've seen his suffering in ways that _you_ can't imagine!" His rifle came up, plasma cannons snapped forward, and Xiphias rail cannons unfolded at his hips. "And you're nothing but a vengeful ghost!"

Twin red-orange plasma bolts, a streak of emerald laser light, and a pair of hyper-velocity slugs tore out into the sky… and then the process repeated itself, again and again, as fast as Freedom's weapons could cycle.

Leviathan unfolded, fuselage snapping into mobile armor mode, and Carnehan rolled furiously, dodging and weaving through the onslaught. "Is that so?" he said contemptuously… a contempt tinged by the faintest trace of surprise, as a rail cannon slug ricocheted off his right wing. "How can someone like you understand? You're just a human!"

A bolt of synthetic lightning nearly ripped his nose before he could pull away. "He may only be a human," Kevin said coldly, "but he's _right._ You're already dead, Mike… we've _both_ died already! My original body is radioactive dust, you're only maintained by your nanomachines… This conflict should've ended years before. You should never have been brought back!"

"A bit late for you to be saying that, Kevin," Mike retorted, sending a mental command to Leviathan's transformation systems. "Like you said, you've already died, too, more than once… and _you're_ the one who killed _me,_ so can the self-righteous garbage! We're _both_ ghosts who don't belong in this world, and I intend to rectify that today!" Leviathan's legs swung down, its arms popping out as it converted to GERWALK mode; with a blast from its foot-mounted thrusters, it darted backward, allowing another barrage from Freedom to scorch past.

Kevin swore viciously in Russian. _This is insane,_ he thought. _This entire battle… If this keeps up, we'll all get fried, just like he says. _Another, more chilling thought occurred to him._ And if Leviathan's reactor goes critical…!_

"This is the destiny we've followed our entire lives, Kevin," Carnehan called, snapping back into mobile suit mode. "From the day we were born, the wheels of destiny were set in motion; our twisted genesis led us down this path, to the inevitable end." From Leviathan's right wrist, a blade of frozen, azure lightning flickered to life, and its back-mounted verniers went to full power, launching it across the sky toward Nemesis.

"What are you talking about, Mike?" Kevin demanded. Without waiting for a reply, he tossed his twin buster rifle skyward, reached up to his shoulder, and snatched out a saber of his own, igniting the azure blade with less than a second to spare; it had barely extended to its full length before Leviathan's blade crashed into it, nearly wrenching it from Nemesis' grip.

Blue sparks flew in all directions, flung out by the clashing blades, as each machine struggled for dominance in the clash. Leviathan's power vied with Nemesis', struggling for the upper hand, to push past the older machine's defenses… but in this Leviathan's tremendous power was not enough of an advantage. Great power flowed through its engines and weapons, but both mobile suits were born of Gundanium alloy; in a battle of brute _physical_ strength, they were still effectively even.

"What I'm talking about is our intended roles," Carnehan said now, speaking through gritted teeth as he struggled against Kevin's blade. "I know now what I was ignorant of at Banadiya, of our connection… and of the long, twisted path we were intended for. You're still ignorant of the truth, Kevin! You still fail to understand that this is our _destiny,_ that the _only_ way out for us is through this battle!"

"I don't know what you're-"

Kevin's voice cut off, and his eyes went wide, for the regular universe abruptly vanished around him. As though through a haze, he watched himself command Nemesis' leg to kick out, forcing Leviathan back a pace. Knocked off balance, the powerful machine almost instantly began to recover, but to Kevin's senses it seemed slow, so slow… and he had all the time in the world to dash forward himself, easily crossing the distance before Kraken could recover.

His blade licked out, slashing up in a vicious backhand stroke. Arcing in from below Leviathan's own blade, the frozen lightning bolt scythed into the underside of Leviathan's right wrist; the Gundanium resisted, refusing to instantly succumb to even Nemesis' weapon, but even it couldn't hold long. Metal vaporized, burned away, power cables shorted out and exploded, hydraulic lines burst as their contents superheated, and then the blade tore out through the saber emitter on the top of the wrist.

With a small explosion, Leviathan's forearm ripped away, spiraling out into open sky.

Kraken uttered a sound of shocked anger. Reaching for his own rifle with Leviathan's remaining hand, his fingers started to wrap around its grip… but Nemesis' own hand had dropped its saber, freeing it to reach out and catch its falling buster rifle.

Without a pause, Kevin brought the rifle up to firing position, switched it to full power, and pulled the trigger.

A titanic column of azure energy, fed by Nemesis' antimatter reactor, erupted from the buster rifle's muzzle. A full eighteen meters in diameter at its widest, it smashed into Leviathan, engulfing it in a terrible blaze of energy even Gundanium was helpless against; phase-shift boiled away, armor melted under the ferocious onslaught-

And with a final scream from Michael Carnehan, the azure stream consumed Leviathan, smashing apart its outer layers in an explosion of shrapnel, swallowing whole the inner frame… before the entire machine blew apart at the seams, its scattered shrapnel wiped from the face of the universe before the all-consuming beam.

Then, to Kevin's horror, the column of manmade lightning kept right on going… and smashed headlong into the Freedom.

As the antimatter conflagration burned Kira Yamato's machine away -taking Cagalli Yula Athha with it- Kevin Walker's scream of anguish was more tiger's roar than human cry…

* * *

The good ship _Minerva_ had just settled -carefully- to the ground outside when Invictus stepped out of the lab. His eyes automatically adjusting to the slight change in lighting, he took up a position next to the main entrance, deciding to simply wait for someone to come out and meet him.

_It's times like this that I miss my armor,_ the assassin thought inconsequentially. _I've lived so long in the shadows that it feels strange to stand here in plain sight… Hah; I'm starting to sound like Tolle. These are_ allies _we're talking about -at least for now- and I'll have my battlesuit back soon enough…_

Shinn and Rey, he noticed, were already limping toward the ship even before a hatch opened; and it wasn't hard for him to understand why, when he took note of the fact that Rey seemed barely conscious. Exactly what was happening to him, Invictus didn't know, but it clearly wasn't good.

Within moments, one of _Minerva_'s hatches _did_ open, disgorging half a dozen armed ZAFT soldiers, wearing body armor instead of their green coats and bearing automatic rifles. They fanned out to either side, taking up defensive positions; only then did the ship's doctor and two orderlies come out at a trot, carrying a stretcher.

"Doctor!" Shinn called, managing to pick up the pace despite his friend's semi-deadweight. "Something's wrong with Rey. He started gasping, and-"

"We'll take it from here," the doctor assured him, and motioned for the orderlies to get Rey onto the stretcher. "And you'd better get to the Infirmary, as well, Shinn," he added, pointing him toward the hatch.

The pilot blinked. "Me?" he said. "Doctor, I'm fine, it's Rey who-"

"We don't know what happened yet," the doctor told him firmly. "If it was something inside that lab, you might be affected, as well, especially with your close contact with Rey on the way out here. We need to make sure you're not affected." Reaching out to grip Shinn's shoulder, he turned back to the ship and began guiding the youth inside, ignoring any further protests.

As they departed, Talia Gladys and Arthur Trine passed them on their way off the ship, both wearing expressions of concern. Not that it was surprising, considering that -among other things- the two pilots represented two-thirds of their available mobile suit strength, what with Athrun still absent and Heine still recovering from his wounds..

Talia spotted Invictus immediately, and quickly walked over to him. "What's going on here, Invictus?" she asked without preamble. "What is this place, and what happened to Rey?"

Invictus shrugged. "I don't have the slightest idea what happened to Rey; it looks almost like a heart attack, but that doesn't seem to make sense. It also doesn't appear to be contagious, since Shinn hasn't been affected." He didn't bother to point out that he and Carter were likewise fine; they were even less vulnerable to environmental hazards than standard Coordinators, what with the enhancements. "As for what this place is… I think you'd better see for yourself, Ma'am. It's not a pleasant sight, but it _is_ important."

She looked at him through narrowed eyes. "And just how 'important' are we talking about, Invictus?" she asked carefully. "Scientifically important, militarily important, politically…?"

The assassin sighed. "More like 'Shinn Asuka is about to be obsolete' important, Captain. Just to start off with the bad news, we found records of Orga Sabnak, Shani Andras, and Clotho Buer here."

Trine went white. "Biological CPUs?" he whispered. "They were made _here?"_

"Right. And that's only the _bad_ news." Invictus jerked his head toward the lab, expression grim. "I don't care to discuss this out in the open, so follow me if you want to see the _worse_ news."

* * *

If Trine had been horrified by the thought of Lodonia being responsible for the creation of the biological CPUs, he was positively stricken by the sight of the tube-encased corpses waiting within… and, as nearly as Invictus could tell, nearly rendered catatonic by the _other_ revelation within the lab.

"This… this can't be," he whispered, gaze flicking rapidly between the children's bodies and the metal-enhanced corpse Carter had hauled out of the other lab chamber.

"How… how can anyone bring themselves to _do_ this to people?"

"Believe me, Trine, this isn't the worst I've ever encountered," Carter said grimly. "You might ask my elder 'brother' what _he_ went through… but yeah," he admitted quietly, "it's pretty bad. And frankly, I haven't the foggiest idea what happened here in the end. It… looks like they started killing each other, and not all that long ago."

"…I think we may all be better off because of it," Talia said softly, staring at the proto-Destroyer corpse. "Jack, Invictus… you're sure these are Destroyer copies?"

"In a manner of speaking," Carter confirmed. "They're not direct copies; the Earth Alliance has never had augmented corpses to examine in detail. But inspired by them? No doubt about it." He nodded at the room he'd pulled the body from. "I hacked the records they didn't quite manage to erase. The techniques are crude, but these _are_ cybernetic organisms, to a far greater extent than any biological CPU."

Trine swallowed hard, trying not to vomit. He was a soldier; he was well accustomed to violence, especially after _Minerva_ launched from Armory One. But… he was a naval officer, not a ground-pounder. _His_ battles were impersonal, fought with missiles and energy fire, at long distance and with several meters of metal separating the people involved from the outside world. He'd seen the occasional aftermath of even that, especially after half of _Minerva_'s bow exploded, but _this…_

"I never thought I'd see the day," he whispered. "This kind of atrocity… and Earth Alliance cyborgs? This is _not_ good."

"Don't call them cyborgs," Invictus snapped, almost reflexively. "Even they deserve more respect than that; we're not monsters out of some cyberpunk novel." He shook his head. "It was inevitable, unfortunately. It was one thing when the only augmented soldier the world knew was Kevin Walker; one example isn't really enough to use as a basis. But with Delta, the two of us, and the others…" The assassin sighed. "One thing is for sure: this war is going to get very interesting soon… in the sense of the Chinese curse."

"Presupposing that this wasn't their only cybernetic research facility," Talia pointed out, tearing her gaze away from Orik's carcass. "And even if it wasn't… You two would be in a better position to judge: just how effective would they even be? These are just augmented Naturals, not Coordinators, right?"

"True," Carter admitted. "Cybernetics don't magically grant everyone the same level of ability simply from receiving the enhancements; it takes a great deal of training -especially if they don't have an adequate source for the RNA part of the treatment- and even there, the strength and reaction time varies based upon what the subject originally had. So yes, Natural Destroyers would be less capable than one of us. That doesn't mean they'd be useless, though; best case, they'd be at least twice as effective as any biological CPU. Worst case…"

He didn't finish the statement, and Talia was just as glad. She didn't think she really wanted to know what the "worst case" was.

_Gil has to be informed of this as soon as possible,_ she thought, taking refuge in professional responsibility. _Commander Arkanian, too. If the Earth Forces_ do _have fully-operational Destroyer analogues -and it would be insane to assume these corpses were the only test subjects- then this war just got a lot more complicated… and more dangerous._

_Though speaking of these corpses… what_ happened _here, anyway?_

Turning to Carter, Talia gestured at the dead body. "Do you have any idea what happened here, Jack? Why all these people are dead, and the lab itself in shambles?"

The clone soldier shrugged. "With all the wreckage around, it's hard to be sure," he admitted. "But it _looks_ like it was some kind of internal dispute… if you can call murdering each other something that banal. Judging from the records I was able to recover, they got orders to shut down the facility; if I had to guess, it was because of _Minerva_ and _Dominion_ setting up shop too close by. Anyway, 'shutting down the facility' appears to have included… removing the test subjects."

"Sweeping the evidence under the rug," Invictus confirmed, visibly disgusted. "All the subjects would be 'neutralized' and disposed of… and that's probably where the trouble began. It looks like at least some of the staffers still had lingering traces of a conscience, and they started shooting at those who didn't. Then the augmented subjects got into the act, and, well…"

Talia nodded in understanding. With that much shooting -and, knowing Destroyers, brute force smashing- going on, it was hardly surprising that, however wrecked it had gotten in the process, the lab was still recognizable. Mostly likely, everyone in it had been dead long before they could get around to disposing of all the evidence.

"Well," she said at length, "I'm certain the Homeland is going to be _very_ interested in hearing about this… and in gathering all the information about it that they can. Arthur," she said, turning to her exec, "get Aves and Alexander in here. We're going to pack up every salvageable piece of equipment and all the bodies; I want them put in storage aboard _Minerva,_ in preparation for transfer to one of our bases."

"Ma'am?" Trine shook himself, trying to shove enough of the horror out of his mind to function properly. "Yes, Ma'am! Right away!"

As he turned and trotted off -gratefully- Talia turned back to the super-soldiers. "Jack, Invictus, I'll want both of you to look them over, as well," she said quietly, "once we've got them aboard. And I'll want specialists from _Dominion_ in on this. I don't like the looks of this at all."

"Believe me, Captain," Invictus said, voice equally quiet, "we don't either. I remember the ABADDON program; I _don't_ want even more of our kind running around… especially not on the side of the Earth Alliance."

* * *

The depths of space were bleak at the best of times. Stunning and awe-inspiring, with a kind of cold, stark beauty, the expanse of the void was still a terribly forbidding place, dark and unforgiving… and that unforgiving nature was only enhanced by the fury of combat.

Kevin Walker's glowing jade eyes were as cold as the space surrounding him as he tracked his opponent, firing twin azure bolts and endless bursts of tungsten penetrators. His machine's wings were split open, forming an "X" whose gaps blazed with rainbow energy, propelling him across space at velocities few machines could match… yet his opponent still lived on.

_"Kevin,"_ a voice was saying urgently in his left mastoid, _"remember! Les Enfant Terribles is-!"_

"You always did talk too much," Kevin's opponent remarked… and raised his weapon.

The machine, resembling the Nemesis, lifted the twin buster rifle it held, and pointed it almost lazily at an _Agamemnon_-class battleship. Before Kevin or the ship could begin to react, the weapon's muzzle glowed… and a titanic burst of azure energy erupted from it, slamming full-force into the _Agamemnon._

Watching it begin to melt away, dissolved by the powerful blast, Kevin uttered a sound more tiger's rage than human's anguish, and snapped up his rifles, simultaneously flipping open his machine cannons. Sending his machine into a violent, unpredictable tumble, he opened fire-

A narrow, emerald dart seared across Kevin's vision, obliterating the scene before him.

The laser beam also obliterated Leviathan's right saber emitter, melting clean through and blasting it apart in a hail of sparks and debris.

Nemesis and Leviathan tumbled out of their blade clash, and Kevin Walker came back to himself with a wrenching gasp, breathing raggedly as he fought for control. Reality had reasserted itself at last, and with an effort that seemed almost titanic he yanked his hand free of Nemesis' neural interface. Activating manual control with his left hand, his right darted forward, almost breaking the red switch in his haste to shut down ZERO.

"Kevin!" Kira called, hurling Freedom across the sky. "Kevin, are you alright?"

Breathing heavily, entire body soaked with sweat, Kevin managed a nod. "Yeah… yeah, I'm here," he said, voice as ragged as his breathing. "I'm… I'm not exactly okay, but I'll live." He nodded gratefully at his friend. "Thanks, tovarisch. Almost… didn't make it out of that one."

Still clinging to the side of Kira's seat, Cagalli heaved a heartfelt sigh of relief. "You _idiot,"_ she breathed. "Do you know how worried I was? First you freeze up, then you start making that unearthly roaring-"

"He'll have more to roar about in a second!" Carnehan hissed angrily. Leviathan's thrusters flared with brutal power, reasserting its stability, and its hand darted down to its right thigh. Its wrist still sparking from the explosion of the saber emitter, Kraken had neither any desire to risk the buster rifle yet nor the patience to reach for it… and he didn't need it.

Leviathan's hand came back up in a flash, clutching one of the machine's beam revolvers; and while they weren't buster-class weapons, they would be more than sufficient to punch through Freedom's armor. With the added advantage of being lighter and less unwieldy that the twin buster rifle, it also came up much faster, faster than Kira expected… and aimed with the keen eye and lightning reflexes of a Destroyer.

"Stay out of this," Carnehan snarled now. "This has nothing to do with-"

Had Leviathan not been equipped with phase-shift armor, even its Gundanium armor would've failed under the wrenching impact that crashed into its main thruster assembly.

The blue bolt went wide, scorching off into the evening sky -frying a hapless seagull two kilometers away- and Leviathan fell away, staggered again. "What the hell! Who did that?" Carnehan demanded, snapping his machine into mobile armor mode. "ZERO-"

"My, my," a softly-accented voice said, as though disappointed. "You really are a bit too much of a monomaniac, you know that? Unlike Nemesis, I, at least, should've shown up on your radar… which you might've noticed, if you weren't quite so intent on frying my boss."

Cagalli glanced at the cockpit's starboard monitor, and exhaled in relief once more. "Good timing, Leona," she called. "This guy's a tough one."

Directly behind the space Leviathan had occupied when it attempted to shoot Freedom, the steel-gray form of Leona Colde's Saber, holding the main blade of Illumina in one hand, hovered easily, wing racks open.

"Yes," Leona agreed, "I can see that. If it wasn't, between the two of you you'd have already reduced him to ash." Her face appearing on Freedom's right communication screen, the newly-minted Destroyer smiled. "Shall we finish the job now? I think this has gone on quite long enough."

Kira blinked… then nodded, smiling thinly. "Yeah," he agreed. "Let's do it." He'd started off the battle disliking Carnehan, if only for trying to kill one of his best friends (and, of course, the small matter of what he'd almost done to Cagalli back in Banadiya); now, having seen some of what Kevin had gone through during his momentary freeze via their link, he _really_ wanted to end it… before anything else could happen to Kevin.

And, just incidentally, before Carnehan finally adjusted to Freedom's attack patterns and blasted it into scrap, too.

"All right, then. Oh, and Colonel?" Leona added, turning to Nemesis. "Pull back a little, please. You nearly got _me_ with one of your errant shots, when you two kept dodging everything you threw at each other before it was even fired. Oh, and I'd really not care to risk having you freeze up in the middle of the battle again."

"But I…" Kevin's voice faded. He was loathe to abandon the battle; he regarded anything and everything to do with the Destroyers to be his personal responsibility, Mike Carnehan in particular. Resurrected with naught but the thought of revenging himself upon Kevin in his mind, the Kraken also piloted Kevin's own brainchild, one which he was not at all convinced Freedom or Saber could defeat.

Yet… he had also just received a very potent lesson in his own limitations. Kevin's skill was on par with that of Athrun, but against his own brethren, his own mind was uncertain. Moreover, the tool _he_ needed in order to battle Foxhound on even terms -ZERO- was counterbalanced by Foxhound's own version.

And by the effects it had on his mind, effects which he feared more than even the prospect of once again killing Mike.

Reaching a decision, Kevin grasped Nemesis' controls, hit a switch, and flipped the machine into mobile armor mode. "I leave the rest of the battle to you," he said softly. "But if Mike survives to escape Foxhound, I'm coming back."

"We know, Kevin," Kira assured him, voice equally quiet. "Now get going… and be careful."

"You're the one who needs to be careful," Kevin retorted, pointed Nemesis' nose toward the sky. "Cagalli…"

"I'll be fine, Kevin," Cagalli told him, staring into his eyes on the monitor. "We all will. _Go."_

"Affirm, Milady." Nemesis' thrusters kicked in with brutal force, launching the machine into a zoom climb that would soon have it far above the battlefield.

Lips curling back in a snarl, Kraken pointed Foxhound's own nose skyward. "Don't think you're getting away, Hydra. This battle is between _us!"_

Before he could charge off in Nemesis' wake, though, a burst of azure lightning scorched past his nose. "You're not going anywhere, Kraken," Leona said coldly, holding Illumina in one hand and Saber's buster rifle in the other. _"We_ are your opponents now."

_And you're facing more than you know, Kraken,_ she thought to herself, glowing gaze fixed on the powerful prototype. _Mon ami recruited me in part to kill him, if the need arose… and while I do not intend to carry out those orders, I _have_ undergone intensive training aimed at that very objective._

_Let's see how my training has paid off…._

"Meddling bastards," Carnehan snarled. "This has nothing to do with you!" He snapped Foxhound back into mobile suit mode, and ignited his remaining saber emitter. _"Nothing!"_

Kira responded by pulling out a blade of his own, the frozen fire that blazed to life contrasting with Foxhound's harnessed lightning. "You just don't get it at all," he said, shaking his head. "You go after one of us; you go after all of us. Kevin's my friend… and his enemies are mine."

"Fine! _Fine!"_ Carnehan yanked out his twin buster rifle, angry enough to ignore the possible repercussions of his hand's earlier damage. "If you want to get in my way, then I'll just kill all of you first. I'll send you all to hell before us!"

"Saber, exterminating the target!" shouted Leona in response, eager to grant Kraken's death wish as Freedom and Saber charged as one towards their solitary foe.

Azure, emerald, and fiery orange energy flashed back and forth across the sky, three mobile suits rushed to engage one another, and Kevin Walker closed his eyes, unable to watch the conflict below as Nemesis soared above it all…

* * *

Author's note:

* * *

Promises are made, revelations are heard, and the truth because ever darker. Athrun Zala makes peace with his friends, while his ship discovers a terrible secret of the Earth Alliance, one with the potential to alter the face of the conflict… and even as he departs to return to them, a final conflict between brothers begins.

This time, only one will walk away alive…

Yep, it's been a year now since I updated this; and for that, I apologize. This one wasn't even work-related, either. Just didn't have any real inspiration for it for quite a while.

Matter of fact, this chapter was supposed to be longer than this… but, since it was getting pretty obvious I wasn't going to be able to do the whole thing properly for a while yet, I figured I'd best cut it off at the earliest possible moment, and go with that. Better a shorter update than none at all, after all this time.

So. A few important revelations in this chapter, I guess, and at least one big divergence from canon -I defy anyone to tell me Athrun was in character during the canon version of that scene!- plus the beginning of the end of one of my too-numerous subplots. Not sure I can vouch for the quality of this, considering how long it took to write… but I guess it probably isn't too disjointed, since it was written in a few big chunks, instead of lots of short spurts (like Cry of the Falcon's latest chapter).

Anyway, rambling over; and I think that's pretty much all I have left to say this time. Let me know if it was any good, while I try and get CotF's next chapter on track (presupposing I ever have time for anything but work and sleep). -Solid Shark


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